


Silence, Please, for the Weighing of the Heart

by Antiquity



Series: Rosetta Stone [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Angst with a Happy Ending, Breaking Up & Making Up, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Injury, M/M, Murder Mystery, Museums
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-02-23 14:01:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 48,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23712637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antiquity/pseuds/Antiquity
Summary: There are plenty of reasons people don’t like walking into work early on a Monday morning, but Kei can safely say that thinking you might find a dead body on the floor of your workroom is not one of them. Not only are the police underfoot but management is breathing down his neck, his boss is on maternity leave, the Egyptology collection needs to be inventoried, and his assistant might just die of shock himself.Oh, and one of the detectives on the case is his ex-boyfriend.Kei doesn't quite know which is worse: being caught up in a murder mystery in his own damn department, dealing with the idiots around him, or working with the ex he's still in love with. He might have to catch the killer to find out.
Relationships: Kuroo Tetsurou/Tsukishima Kei, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Yachi Hitoka/Yamaguchi Tadashi
Series: Rosetta Stone [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1721578
Comments: 204
Kudos: 589
Collections: HQ Feels (Mostly M or E), The Heartbreak Is Worth It





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So a few months back I found Haikyuu!! on Netflix and thought, hey that looks fun, I used to play volleyball a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, maybe I should give it a try. Next thing I know, I'm on my 3rd re-watch and I have 50 new precious babies, 3 new OTPs, a Karasuno tote bag, an Oikawa keyring, and I sat down like a week ago to write a brief H/C scene and nearly 50,000 words accidentally spilled out of me. God I love this show :'D 
> 
> Anyways, please enjoy this humble offering! I loved writing it, since canon!Kei is into museums and that is my shit! He's working in Egyptology mostly because I spent a semester cataloging amulets; most of the day-to-day work in here is relatively accurate, but I'm not intending in any way to comment on museum administration. I love museums! Most do the right thing :) There is character injury, a hospitalisation that results, and discussion of the death of an unrelated OC, in case anyone needs a heads-up.
> 
> Much love as always to my amazing indefatigable adayofjoy, who proofread this for me from a state away while knowing nothing about the anime, and to my sister Ladyriver, who read the first scene and chained me to my tablet until I finished, cheering all the way. ❤️❤️
> 
> CHAPTER 5 NOW HAS ACTUAL AMAZING FANART??!! It’s the most stunning, incredible thing I’ve ever seen, and stillnotovermylordsixth is too good for this world in general, and me specifically ❤️ 
> 
> TL;DR This is half detective story, half shameless H/C romantic reconciliation fluff, and I don't regret a thing :D Some of the various OCs have names pulled from shows I enjoyed: they mean nothing except a giggle. There are also some memes sprinkled through; I couldn't resist. Hope you enjoy!

There are plenty of reasons people don’t like walking into work early on a Monday morning, but Kei can safely say that thinking you might find a dead body on the floor of your workroom is not one of them.

He stands there mid-stride for a moment, one hand coming up automatically to adjust his glasses like the body and the blood could be explained if he just wiped the smudges from his lenses, before his stomach goes cold.

“Oh,” is his first response. “Shit,” is his second, equally articulate. Then, finally, his mind comes back online, especially the part that spent three years in close proximity to the police. Taking a swift, comprehensive look around, Kei retreats carefully the way he came and strides back up the staircase towards the central foyer and the _security guard station_ , what the hell?

“Senju-san,” Kei says sharply, and the portly security guard looks up from his magazine with all the cheerful unconcern of someone with less than an hour left of their shift.

“Something the matter, Tsukishima-san?”

“You could say that,” Kei says, gripping his phone tightly to still the trembling in his fingers. “There’s a dead body on my workroom floor. Please prepare all of last night’s security footage and notes while I call the police. _Now_ ,” he barks, when Senju just stares at him.

“What do you mean, a dead –”

“I mean exactly what I say, Senju-san.”

“A dead –” the guard goes very pale. “Here?”

Kei has been accused of many things: being overly compassionate is not one of them. “Yes, here,” he snaps. “Where you and your team are supposed to be guarding. Call your supervisor.”

Senju clutches at his chest as Kei stalks off to the side, and he hopes distantly that he won’t have two dead bodies on his hands as he dials.

“ _Emergency services, what assistance do you require?_ ”

“Police, please,” Kei says, leaning against the wall and keeping his voice steady. “There’s a dead body in the City Museum. It looks like his throat has been cut. The scene is secure for now, so I will wait outside to direct the first responders.”

The dispatcher is far too well trained to betray her surprise at his businesslike tone as she collects his details and assures him help is on the way. Kei thanks her and hangs up, both relieved he’s the only one here early enough to deal with the situation and angrily incredulous he’s the one who has to deal with this, _there’s a dead body in his department_ , he’s wearing the night janitor uniform of the museum, this is _way_ beyond his purview – unless he’s been dead for four thousand years Kei has absolutely no recourse for any of this.

Inhale, exhale. Freaking out is going to do absolutely nothing to change the situation. Inhale, exhale. The president of the Board next, who is sure to be delighted to receive a call at six-thirty in the morning on a Monday, regardless of the content.

The media is going to have a field day with this, too. Kei can actually feel his headache begin, especially when Senju almost falls out of his booth to scurry to the toilet, whimpering about his job. What a mess. What a complete and utter calamity of a morning. And of course Uzumaki-san is on maternity leave. Now Kei, normally delighted to be acting curator in her stead, wishes for a guilty moment she’d chosen a better, more convenient time to have a baby so he could foist this responsibility onto her instead.

Nothing much he can do to change it now, so Kei calls the president, reaches voicemail, thank god, and leaves a message before bundling back up into in his coat and waiting in the frigid early morning for the police.

It’s mostly quiet, except for the background sound of the traffic, and Kei breathes deeply for three minutes of peace until a police car and an ambulance pull in, cutting their sirens when they reach the car park.

He greets the uniformed officers – no one he knows, praise god for small mercies – and leads them and the paramedics down into the Egyptology department. He answers the senior officer’s initial questions, shows him the security booth to which Senju has yet to return, confirms his identity, and asks to be notified when the forensics team arrives so he can unlock his office for them. Thank god the rest of the collection is in the storage room further down the corridor.

“Why do we need to wait?” asks a junior officer, puffing up his chest.

Kei looks down his nose at him, can’t help it – he has at least fifteen centimetres on the man. “Unless it has escaped your notice, this is a museum. There are a number of fragile artefacts in my climate-controlled office which have existed for a few thousand years more than you have.”

Ah. That was a little sharp. Force of habit, one which Kei thought adulthood had lessened: to lash out as coldly as he could when questioned. No doubt he’s made himself more suspicious in their eyes, but the condition of the artefacts remains one of his priorities.

The junior officer frowns, belligerence in every line of his body, but his senior glares him down and then warns Kei, “We’ll be discussing this with the detectives.”

Kei is perhaps the last person on earth likely to be intimidated by that. “As will I,” he assures them, completely sincere.

After the preliminaries are finally finished, he’s asked to sit upstairs in the foyer with another officer until the detectives arrive. He’d really rather curl back up in bed with his headphones blocking out the world, but it doesn’t look like that’ll be happening any time soon. Senju is also being spoken to, looking like he’s aged ten years in ten minutes, and Kei takes a seat in the opposite corner as far away from the voluble protestations about job performance as possible.

He only had a half a cup of coffee this morning, too, and the lack of caffeine is no doubt just one reason among many that his hands are shaking and his stomach is churning and his heart is beating with the quick quick fright of the unwelcome inversion of how the world is supposed to work. Why is there a dead body is his workroom? Why has someone been murdered in the museum, blood congealing from the slashed flesh of the man’s throat all over the floor?

Kei takes his glasses off and digs his knuckles into the bridge of his nose before replacing them, sorely regretting his choice not to finish his goddamn cup of coffee before he left. He wants to go back to bed, he wants this morning to rewind and play out like it’s supposed to with a stack of work all that’s waiting for him downstairs, he wants – he wants –

Tetsurou’s voice.

Kei whips his head up, heart clenching, and any thought he’d imagined it is wiped away when he meets Detective Inspector Kuroo’s equally shocked gaze as the uniformed officer says, “...and the assistant curator, Tsukishima Kei-san, was the one who discovered the body.”

And here Kei thought there was no way the morning could get _worse_. He looks away, fingers twisting painfully together in his lap as he stares down at his knees. Of all the detectives in all the units in all of the city, it had to be him. Why is he here? How is he here? What happened to the transfer? If he’s still here, then what was the point of _any_ of it?

A steaming can of vending machine coffee appears in his field of vision and Kei reluctantly looks up from his internal meltdown into Detective Inspector Oikawa’s face. He’s hardly better than Tets – than Inspector Kuroo, who clearly left it to his partner to interview Kei rather than face him himself.

“Won’t this be considered a conflict of interest?” Kei scrapes his voice together and takes the coffee with bad grace. It’s hot caffeine, after all. His defensive reaction has always been to utilise his sharp tongue – never a wise course of action when talking to police detectives, and even less so with this one in particular. Bad coffee is still coffee.

“Not necessarily,” says Oikawa, taking a seat beside him and pulling out his notebook. _You broke up_ , he doesn’t say.

Kei wages a brief, intense war with his better judgement. “I thought you would have transferred by now.”

“Thank internal politics for our continued presence.” Oikawa’s sideways glance burns the side of Kei’s head but he forces himself not to react. “Anyway, regarding this case, our dear inspector will have to disclose it to the higher-ups, of course, but we’re a little short on manpower thanks to the rally down south. Even if the brass did have an issue with it, they won’t have anyone else available for the next few days. And if you’re going to cast aspersions on _my_ professionalism...” Oikawa trails off, swift sword-slash grin across his face.

Oddly, the menace in Oikawa’s expression makes Kei feel a little better. Nothing matters more to Oikawa than his career and Iwaizumi; he won’t jeopardise his near-flawless track record by doubting his work partner’s ex.

Kei tries to relax the tension in his shoulders as he wraps his cold hands around the can, but it still feels like his chest is constricted by bands of iron. So, they’re still here. No time to mope: even if he ended up staying in the same city, it’s still over. Get over it, don’t think about it. He notices his knee is bouncing and ceases the movement immediately, pressing both heels firmly to the floor. His first impulse is to help the police as much as he can – Tetsurou’s impassioned rants about idiots who withheld important information to their own detriment echo in his head – and his second, certainty more overpowering, impulse is to be as difficult as possible. He can be very, very difficult.

The two competing desires threaten to turn his budding headache into a migraine as his heart ignores him and aches in his chest.

“How’s my little Tobio doing with the drugs squad?”

Surprised, Kei glances over at Oikawa. He’s swivelled to face Kei, one knee crossed over the other and notebook left closed, nonthreatening, on top. The pleasant invitation to shared mockery on his face makes him look approachable, genuine: all unfortunately wasted on Kei, who knows how dangerous his sharp eyes and steel-trap mind can be.

Still, an opportunity to mock Kageyama is never one to be passed up, even if, “Wouldn’t you know that more than me?”

The detective tosses his head. “Like I’d go near that short-tempered lot. Besides, my mentorship duties ended after his first year out of the academy, and precocious little brats with too much talent and no team spirit to speak of are hardly one of my priorities.”

Kei accepts this, well aware of Kageyama’s worshipful competitive feud with his one-time mentor. “He just finished his first undercover training operation.”

Oikawa blinks once, slowly, in exquisite torment, and Kei smirks at the desired response as his spirits lift slightly.

“Apparently Chief Inspector Kendo hasn’t had anyone with Kageyama’s pinpoint accuracy before, and Daichi-san helps out where he can, but Kageyama hadn’t even finished his first sentence before the trainer picked him out as the undercover cop and shot him with a paintball. Twice. He’s still sure he wants to go into special ops, but for now he’s stuck in this placement.”

“I do adore hearing about his abysmal failures,” Oikawa sighs happily, and Kei finds himself in the horrifying position of debating whether to agree whole-heartedly, or to point out, rather smugly, that Kageyama’s first-year arrest rate beat Oikawa’s by nearly ten percent.

“How’s Iwaizumi-san?” he asks instead. Kuroo got Bokuto and Akaashi in the break-up, and even though Kei was never particularly close to Oikawa he got along well enough with Iwaizumi at various police-and-plus-one functions that he resents losing more mutual friends than Kuroo to the wretched mess between them.

This time, the smile lights up Oikawa’s eyes. “He’s fine. Thinking about letting Mad Dog and Kunimi take on more responsibility at the garage, since Yamaha and Kawasaki have started a bidding war over him designing their next series. You should get back in touch with Kunimi, you know,” he adds, twirling his pen between his fingers. “He’s started to pout when it takes someone more than thirty seconds to realise they’ve been insulted.”

Kei looks away. It’s been two months and he still feels like he exists in a barren bank of fog, colour washed out of the world and hazy grey at every edge, but he’s getting sick of his own misery. Even though neither Tadashi nor Hitoka ever said so, he’s sure they’re relieved he moved out of their spare room into Nishinoya’s vacant apartment a few weeks ago. He’ll email Kunimi later, Kei decides. At least he’s a friend made through mutual enjoyment of needling Kageyama and not through Oikawa.

“Should we get on with this?” he prompts instead, finishing the last grits of his coffee and leaning back in his seat. Oikawa smiles, the sly bastard, and flips open his pristine notebook, the ring on his left hand glinting under the lights.

“Take me through what happened this morning.”

“I arrived at work at six-thirty, disarmed the side door’s alarm, and then checked in with Senju-san. The alarm had begun its usual thirty second countdown from the moment I opened the door, and the guard hadn’t noticed anything. None of the other alarms seem to have gone off, either.”

“Others?”

Kei nods. “Any museum of a certain size isn’t focused on stopping thieves or trespassers from getting in,” he explains, tipping his head toward the ticket office and the security cameras perched above every doorway. “They’re always more concerned with stopping the thieves from getting out with the loot. Unenthused as Senju-san might be with some aspects of his duty, I can’t imagine he’d have missed the sound of an alarm going off. Besides, we would have been alerted if there had been an actual attempt on any of the artefacts on display and the security grates and barriers would have come down over the doors.”

“Have there been any issues with Senju-san before?” Oikawa asks, and Kei wants to bite his tongue.

“None that you’ll find on record,” he says at last, glancing under his lashes toward the guard, who’s now being interviewed by Detective Inspector Kuroo and still looks worse for wear, patting at the sweat beading along his receding hairline with a wad of tissues. “He’s not incapable, merely lazy. Guards are meant to patrol certain locations every hour, but he tends to simply rely on the monitors.”

He has no personal problems with Senju, but he’s not going to back away from ugly truths.

“And do many people know about his habits?”

Kei twists his fingers, thinking. “Yes, probably. He’s worked the weekend night shifts for the last several years.”

“Is he the only guard?”

With a shrug, Kei says, “I think there are four employed for the nightshift and each nightshift is probably split into two, but I don’t know names or routes. Senju-san is just the one I see most because he finishes when I usually arrive on Monday mornings.”

“Thank you,” Oikawa says. “Would the patrol cover the workrooms?”

“I doubt it, or at least, not more than once or twice a night,” Kei answers, adjusting his glasses as his mind whirls. None of the evidence points towards a comforting conclusion. “There are eight workrooms across the different departments, two conservation labs and five collaborative teaching spaces. The assailant must have had access to the back rooms on a Sunday, and have known about the guards and their habits. They must also have been looking for something in particular, or something not immediately obvious as valuable.”

“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Oikawa cautions, pen sweeping over the page. “Do the janitors have their own keys and codes?”

Kei reluctantly leaves it at that. As much as the knowledge that someone has broken into the museum and committed a murder rakes across his mind like fingernails across a blackboard, starts hitting keys in his mind like some garishly-realistic game of Clue, this isn’t his job. Oikawa and Kuroo have access to more resources; Kei can say he has faith in their professional abilities if nothing else.

“Yes, I think so. You’d have to check with Yamada-san, the head of the administration department, and with Kyusabe-san, who’s chief of security.”

“Why were you here so early?”

Kei’s mouth thins, but Oikawa’s voice is calm and professional. “I had work to do. We received a donation of Late Period ushabtis last week and I wanted to start accessioning them. The curator of the department is on maternity leave for another four months, so I’m acting as curator in her stead.”

“Would anybody else have been in over the weekend?”

“No, not to my knowledge. The museum galleries are open to the public, but obviously the collection storage and workrooms are off-limits. You need a key card,” he holds his own up as an example, “to gain access, or you have to be let in either by security or someone already inside. The collections’ staff work Monday to Friday unless we have an exhibition to prepare for, and I highly doubt any of my team was here over the weekend since I wasn’t. I obviously can’t speak for any of the other departments.”

Oikawa makes another note and then nods. “So you went down to the Egyptology department.”

“I had just entered the workroom when I saw the – the body. I didn’t touch anything or go any further, so I couldn’t positively confirm he was dead, but his throat...” Kei trails off and waves a hand at his own neck, swallowing down the memory of all the cold congealed blood on the floor around the slash in pale flesh. “It seemed fairly evident.”

Oikawa pauses his swift shorthand and looks up, running his eyes over Kei once more. “Has anyone offered you anything? A blanket, something to eat?”

Kei shakes his head. “I don’t think I made a very good impression on uniform,” he shrugs.

“Perish the thought,” Oikawa mutters under his breath. “Still, that’s no excuse. Would you like anything?”

“To go home and sleep,” Kei responds immediately. “Let’s just finish this so I can.”

The detective considers him and then nods. “Did you recognise the deceased?”

“No, I don’t think so,” Kei says, frowning. “I didn’t look very closely at his face. I just recognised the uniform and saw the blood. I walked out without touching anything and spoke to Senju-san before I called the police. I also left a message with the president of the Board of Trustees, so I assume he’ll arrive soon. I waited outside for the police and took them down to the body when they arrived. I told them I’d wait for you before I unlocked my office. It’s the door at the back on the right, well away from the body. I have some sensitive artefacts in there that need a controlled climate.” He holds his keycard out to Oikawa. “I would appreciate it if you would please ask your team to be careful with them if you do need to enter the office, and to handle them with gloves.”

Oikawa takes the keycard and stows it inside his jacket. “Your office and workroom are, I assume, part of the central security system?”

Kei nods, “All doors lock automatically at six o’clock every evening, and an ordinary keycard, like most of the part time staff have, won’t have the authorisation to open them. You can get the list of authorised upper-management cards from security. Like I said, to get in here, the murderer either was authorised or had worked out a way to bypass the system. God, this might be bigger than one body.” He rubs the back of his neck, stress just winding his spine tighter and tighter. They’re going to have to stocktake the collection to see if anything was taken. That’s an annual task for a reason.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Oikawa warns him again. “Do the door readers record the card swipes?”

“I believe so,” Kei answers, dropping his hand and trying not to let on he was counting his breaths. “Again, you’ll need to talk to security about that.”

“And there was nothing out of the ordinary when you arrived this morning?”

“No, nothing,” answers Kei. There had been nothing to warn him he was about to walk into a murder scene – and just thinking that finally sets the last chills into his stomach, that this is real. Nothing had been out of place, except for the body on the floor. “I have to look over the workroom more closely if you want any indication of what might have gone on in there.”

“We’ll have to take you up on that, and open your office, but I’ll have forensics be quick so we can minimise the disturbance to the objects.”

Kei stares at him. “Why are you being so accommodating?”

Oikawa lifts both neat eyebrows and blinks at him, lashes fluttering. Why the hell is he dressed so immaculately at seven o’clock in the morning anyway? Kei knows for a fact thanks to Tetsurou’s griping that Oikawa’s skincare regime takes at least ten minutes, even when he has to rush. “Whatever do you mean, four-eyes? When have I ever not been a model of delightful consideration?”

Kei narrows his eyes and tilts his head just so – he’s still taller than Oikawa.

Oikawa wrinkles his nose at Kei and flips his notebook closed. “It’s not like the police exist solely to make your life harder, you know, and I like museums. I also happen to be an excellent detective. However, please remain available for further questioning, or I won’t be quite so polite.” This time, the smile isn’t pleasant as Oikawa stands and walks away, and Kei’s hackles rise even as he knows Oikawa was purposefully baiting him.

He barely has time to splash his face with cold water in the bathroom before the foghorn voice of the budget-cutting egotist masquerading as the president of the Board of Trustees bellows through the atrium.

“What is the meaning of this?”

Kei sets his teeth, adjusts his glasses, and walks out into the valley to join the six hundred.

“Kawashita-san,” he says, and the man turns on him.

“Tsukishima, how could this have happened?”

“I’m sure the police will do everything they can –”

“They had better,” roars Kawashita, “considering what we donate to their program! But how did it even get to the state of needing the police?”

Kei is familiar with Kawashita’s bullheadedness and harbours a deep and satisfying fondness for seeing how many times he can rephrase one of the man’s egotistical plans in such a way as to highlight the plan’s ineptitude in direct conversation with him and get away with it. That being said, sometimes the depths of the president’s rose-tinted ignorance truly astonishes him.

“With all due respect, sir, there was a dead body in one of the museum’s own janitor uniforms on my workroom floor.”

“But how did he get there? Who was he? How dare anyone bring their petty grudges into such a sacred space? What if an object had been damaged? Good grief, was there an attempt on the collection? We have to stocktake the Egyptology department immediately! We must reassure the investors that nothing drastic has happened!”

And that is what Kei was afraid he’d demand.

“Sir,” he says, getting in front of Kawashita as quickly as he can, “we cannot get in the way of the police.”

“Irrelevant,” Kawashita barks, making to push Kei aside.

“Sir,” Kei says again, a little colder, “the museum will not be able to withstand the negative press of both a murder and its president being arrested for obstruction of justice.”

That gets through to him, but any triumph in Kei’s chest dulls immediately upon hearing Inspector Kuroo say unemotionally from behind him, “Tsukishima-san is correct, sir. If you would be so kind as to give me a moment of your time, in your office, perhaps, we can begin making this as convenient for you and your employees as possible. I’m Detective Inspector Kuroo, and with your help we’ll be able to make excellent progress.”

Kei refuses to turn around, instead watching the colour fade from Kawashita’s face at Kuroo’s typically expert handling. Tsukishima-san, huh. Kuroo hasn’t called him anything closer to his last name than Tsukki in over a year. Something else he didn’t think he’d have to readjust to.

“True,” Kawashita says, stroking his goatee. “I’ll need to go over our policies and procedures with you and settle on a statement before the media gets wind of this disaster.”

“Very good, sir. Tsukishima-san, Officer Kindaichi will escort you down to Detective Oikawa,” Kuroo says, also displaying great skill in the game of Avoiding Each Other’s Gaze as he steps around Kei. “Kawashita-san, after you.”

Kindaichi leads Kei silently back down to the Egyptology department. It’s nearing eight o’clock and Kei wonders if Kawashita, or, more accurately, his assistant, will think to suspend work that day.

They come to a halt just outside the workroom, where police tape has been strung across the open doorway. Oikawa is waiting there, talking to one of the forensic technicians who’s fully suited up and waving one gloved hand around.

“– pathologist is finishing up her preliminary report,” she’s saying, “and we’re dusting for fingerprints. We just need to know how far in to go.”

Oikawa turns at the sounds of Kei and his escort’s footsteps. “Speak of the devil,” he says. “Tsukishima-san, if you wouldn’t mind casting your eye over the room and telling us if there’s anything you think is amiss.”

Kei swallows and steps next to him, peering inside. The body has been covered, at least, and he looks around. The work table in the centre has its usual pile of reference books, foam off-cuts, hieroglyph charts and rejected object mounts cluttering the surface, all currently being powdered and print-tested. The long bench down the right side has four computers dotted along it, with a stack of books between each. Below the bench at the far end is a squat five-shelf tool box filled with rulers, knives, scissors, foam and calico sheets, power tools and electrical cables. A corner cabinet stuffed with the detritus of past exhibition fancies, old foam pieces and replicas sits between the end of the bench and the wall into the corridor. The back wall has windows set into it, through which Kei can see two forensic technicians going through his office with at least some of the caution Oikawa promised.

The body lies between the work table and the six compactus shelving rows that make up the left side of the room.

“Apologies,” Kei murmurs to who he assumes is the head technician. “This must be a very cluttered environment for you to work in.”

She shrugs. “Not as bad as some. So, is there anything odd?”

Kei looks again at the rows of filing shelves, where some research-based artefacts are stored and where all of the hard-copies of the Egyptology collection files are kept. “Have you opened the compactus yet?”

“We’ve only just started dusting all the wheels and handles for prints,” she tells him, and Kei purses his lips.

“The sixth row is open too far,” he says. “I know I closed them all when I left on Friday, since my team had been getting sloppy about that and we’d had another seminar on Health and Safety in the workplace. Most useless thing known to man, but the Board does insist. Bays ten and eleven are accessible once you wheel open the sixth unit. The compactus is where all the hard-copy files for our objects are stored, and it also houses some of the hardier research objects we keep nearby for comparisons and typical examples.”

Oikawa hums. “Can you tell from here what might be of interest there?”

Kei reels off a list of object numbers and categories. “They’re all files for fairly recent acquisitions, within the last ten years. Without doing a stocktake, or without your team telling me if anything has been tampered with, I can’t give you anything that might link to the murder. There aren’t any objects in those bays, at least.”

He wants to ask, _do you think the janitor disturbed somebody who wasn’t mean to be here_? But Oikawa wouldn’t tell him even if he did ask and Kei doesn’t see what could be of interest in the workroom. He says it out loud, too, just in case. “We don’t even keep any valuable artefacts here,” he adds. “I would understand it if the body had been found in one of the artefact storage units, but here? It’s just files and books.”

“Knowledge is power,” Oikawa says vaguely, scribbling something down in his notebook. “Hitachi, if you would make bays ten and eleven your priority before continuing on, that would be helpful. Now, Tsukishima, we’ll need to take your fingerprints and you’ll need to write up your official statement. I’m sorry to inform you, however, that your workroom and office will remain off-limits until further notice.”

Kei grits his teeth but acquiesces. Kawashita is most likely going to have an apoplexy, but Kei at least can access the database from any terminal and since the storage units are further down the corridor, he can foresee where he’ll be spending most of his time.

“Thank you for your cooperation,” Oikawa says, those sharp, sharp eyes flaying Kei open for a long moment. “We’ll contact you if we have any other questions.”

With a curt nod just this side of rude, Kei spins around on his heel.

He hears along the grape vine that Kawashita ended up bowing to the near-unanimous vote of the Board and closed the museum as he stands with the other early-bird staff waiting to have their statements taken. Kei can already see lines of media cars lining up in the car park outside, where there are several uniformed constables standing guard. Staff scurry in from the side entrance and the rear loading door, and Kei watches the gossip travel swift as wildfire as he steps up to have his fingerprints pressed into ink.

Reactions are varied, but most are split between ghoulish curiosity and horrified shock. Matsumoto from the Greek and Roman departments offers his support after hearing Kei found the body; Murase from visitor engagement looks one loud noise away from a fainting fit; Kida who curates the Edo period displays whispers something about a pharaoh’s curse; and steel-backed harridan Reizei from administration has already set up a tea and coffee station after glaring Honda from finance into submission.

Kei honestly just wants to throw them all off the roof and then sleep for a thousand years. If one of the pharaohs has sent a curse, he’ll direct the flesh-eating scarabs towards Kida and call it a public service.

“And now the left hand,” Sergeant Uchiyama says, pressing Kei’s fingers into the ink.

“When you’re finished, Tsukishima-san,” Kawashita’s secretary pants, rushing up to Kei with half her hair falling out of its usually pristine arrangement, “Kawashita-sama wants to see you.”

“My day just keeps getting better,” Kei remarks under his breath.

“And Saito-san wants your assistance with a press release,” she adds, and Kei is grateful for the wipes Uchiyama has given him to remove the ink from his skin; they hide the way Kei’s fingers turn white from how tightly he’s gripping them together, nails digging crimson crescents into his own skin.

“Is it too late to swap places with the corpse in the basement?” he asks, and the police sergeant coughs over his chuckle like he can’t decide if he‘s allowed to laugh at that or not. Funny, Kei’s not even half joking at this point.

“Um, I thought we weren’t supposed to touch anything inside the crime scene,” Otori says uncertainly, trailing after Kei as he strides over towards the president’s office.

“God grant me patience,” Kei sighs through his teeth.

“I thought God was supposed to grant strength?”

“If the gods gave me strength, everybody would be dead.”

Otori gives him the incredulously shocked look passengers in an airport terminal might give someone who’d just joked about a bomb in their backpack, but fortunately they reach the door before she can say anything else.

Unfortunately, Kuroo steps out just as Kei steps forward and the awkward doorway dance has never been more excruciating than when you’re trying to dodge the ex you’re still in love with and avoid any temptation to touch the soft skin of his inner wrist where the not-quite-ironed cuff of the shirt you gave him last Christmas doesn’t cover.

It only takes two seconds for Kuroo to slide left and for Kei to cut right, but it feels much longer. It feels – it feels exactly like what it is: the first time in two months that they’ve been close enough to feel each other’s heat, to look into each other’s eyes, to smell their aftershave, when sixty-two days ago they went to sleep pressed skin to skin and woke up curled face to face.

Kei doesn’t slam the door behind him, but only just.

“Ah, Tsukishima.” Kawashita gestures at the seat in front of his desk. Saito, the head of the public relations department, is already there, along with the five other Trustees, a lawyer, and someone Kei doesn’t recognise but assumes is a PR representative from the police. “We need to discuss moving forward, now that I trust I’ve set the detectives right on their priorities.”

Kei sincerely doubts that, but he silently takes a seat, nodding to the other executives as he does.

“Yes, we’ve managed to clear up a few things. Detective Inspector Kuroo assures me their team will be finished with your workroom by this evening at the latest and that from tomorrow we can begin using the space as normal. Tsukishima, obviously your priority in the meantime is to stocktake your collection. Our security records are being handed over to the police as we speak, so I’m confident that this will all be resolved in the next few days. I’m sure someone was just trying to take a chance and the poor janitor stumbled upon him, but we as a museum must remain strong and reassure the public that they have nothing to fear. Saito-san?”

The man strokes his sleek silver moustache. “We are rightly prohibited from offering any opinions on the crime, but you are right, Kawashita-san, in saying we must act quickly so as to reassure not only the public, but all our valued donors and partners that every action is being taken to bring the assailant to justice and that there is no danger to any of our visitors. To that end, Tachibana-san from the Metropolitan Police and I will script a brief interview and I will present a press conference in one hour on the steps of the museum. Tsukishima, do we know if there have been any objects stolen?”

“No, sir,” he replies. “We haven’t had time to conduct even a preliminary overview.”

“Well, I believe it would be wise to discourage thoughts of theft,” Saito says. “In your capacity as acting curator, did it seem like we were missing anything?”

Kei hesitates, disliking being forced into giving an opinion without evidence to support it. “I honestly can’t say, sir. I wasn’t able to enter either my workroom or my office. I do know that our newest acquisitions were still in my office, as I saw forensics handling them.”

“Let’s run with that,” Saito nods. “Nothing appears to be missing, all our energies will be devoted to protecting the artefacts entrusted to us, caretakers of the past for the future, the usual. Thank you, Tsukishima. If you discover differently, notify us at once.”

“Yes, sir,” Kei says, standing, relieved beyond the telling of it not to be part of the actual press conference. Though – “May I ask who the deceased is?” He can’t believe it’s taken him this long: the man is dead on his floor, and Kei doesn’t even know who he is.

Saito glances down at his notes. “He’s been identified as a Tsubasa Neito-san, one of the night janitors contracted to the museum from Camellia Work Solutions, our cleaning company.”

“Does his family know?” Kei asks, looking at Tachibana.

He nods. “Family liaison was dispatched this morning, shortly after the detectives arrived. His employer at Work Solutions has also been notified.”

Kei nods. Rest in peace, Tsubasa Neito, he thinks. I’m sorry that being in my workroom got you killed. I wish I knew what it was in my workroom that got you killed, so I can make sure it doesn’t happen again. “And the fact that I was the one who discovered the body? Is there any way I could request that that not be made public?”

Saito, the museum’s lawyer, and Tachibana all glance at each other before the latter says, “I don’t believe it will be relevant. The conference will only mention a museum worker.”

“Thank you very much, sir,” Kei says, even more relieved.

He spends the next ten minutes writing out his statement under the watchful gaze of an officer he vaguely recognises from Kuroo’s precinct, and after he’s signed and handed it over, Nanase, one of his collections’ staff acting as his assistant curator, makes a beeline for him.

“Sir!”

Kei beckons him over to a nearby free patch of wall. “Nanase, good, you’re here.”

“Sir, it’s such dreadful news! And people are saying you found the body; are you sure you’re alright? What’s going to happen to our workroom? Was anything taken?”

Kei has to grab his shoulder for the man to stop babbling. “Nanase, get a hold of yourself. We have work to do. Gather our department and report back here to the police; you’ll need to have your fingerprints taken before we can –”

“Fingerprints?” Nanase repeats, terrified.

“So they can be accounted for,” Kei snaps. “The workroom is covered in our fingerprints; the police need to know who’s who. Unless you’re implying you have something to hide?”

He regrets teasing Nanase as soon as the man goes pale enough he might actually in danger of collapsing. “No, I didn’t mean that, Nanase, pull yourself together!”

“Yes, sir,” Nanase mumbles hoarsely, loosening the tie at his throat.

“But the detectives will most likely interview our department to confirm your whereabouts anyway,” Kei adds, only a little sadistically. It’s like throwing fuel onto a bonfire, but instead of exploding into an inferno, it’s more like imploding inwards into a black hole of despair. Nanase is a hard worker and an able assistant, but the man has probably never even gotten a parking ticket, let alone crossed the street before the red man turned green.

He lets Nanase panic incoherently for maybe another thirty seconds before smacking him bracingly on the shoulder. “By the time that’s finished, perhaps the police will have more of a lead. We also have to prepare for stocktake, in case this murder is linked to an attempted theft. I’ll be in the storage room, so bring the others once you’ve finished with the police.”

Walking back down the corridor that leads to the workroom and the Egyptian collection storage rooms, Kei hopes the apprehension in his stomach is evicted as quickly as it’s moved in. There’s nothing wrong with this corridor and he doesn’t have time for his mind to start associating it with dead bodies and fright. He has work to do.

Inspectors Oikawa and Kuroo are standing in front of the workroom door, backs to the staircase where Kei immediately pauses so he can hear better.

“– about to remove the body, so just get back to the station and leave me to do the press conference, alright, Tetsu-chan?”

“You just like being on camera,” Kuroo tuts, jostling Oikawa fondly with an elbow.

“Well, obviously,” Oikawa says, tossing his head. “It would be a crying shame if the nation missed its chance to rest its tired eyes upon my perfect countenance. Now, stop trying to distract me from the fact that you need to go and fill out those conflict of interest forms before we both get railroaded by the Public Safety Commission and benched for malpractice, and _get going._ If fucking Ushiwaka and fucking Organised Crime swoop in at the last moment to steal our arrest _again_ I’ll kill you myself, Tetsu-chan.”

Something cold and unpleasant drips into Kei’s stomach despite himself, but Kuroo just snorts. “At least dispose of me properly, okay? Some sodium hydroxide or something, not a garbage dump.”

“I’ll even keep your skull on my desk,” Oikawa offers magnanimously. “And any time a new partner asks what happens to my old one, I’ll pick up your skull à la Hamlet and say, _alas,_ _no one knows – we never found his body_. Now stop stalling, or I really will have your head.”

Tetsurou once tried to describe a detective partnership to Kei, after a case had run them ragged for two weeks straight and ended in a successful arrest, a blazing row, and enough alcohol at a barbeque night afterwards to have them both weeping over each other’s hair. Not quite a sibling, he’d said, and not quite a spouse. You’d die for each other if you had to, but thank fuck you didn’t go home together at the end of the day because then you would be the one to kill them.

Thinking about such a durable relationship makes his chest hurt, though, so as Kuroo sighs acceptance Kei continues down the steps, letting his footsteps be heard. They turn immediately and he nods, gaze calmly fixed on a point on the far wall between their heads.

“Tsukishima,” says Oikawa. “Is there anything we can help with?”

“Unless you can produce the murderer before I have to inventory five hundred and sixty-four ancient Egyptian artefacts, no, I don’t believe so.”

They blink.

“Did you think we were being dramatic about not wanting to stocktake the whole collection without a more accurate idea of what we were looking for?” Kei asks, walking past them towards the storage room. “Goodness. And here I thought police detectives understood the importance of thoroughness. My mistake.”

As he reaches the door, there’s a brief whispered conference behind him and then Oikawa says, sounding a little put-upon, “Tsukishima, one last thing.”

Kei cracks open the door after the card reader goes green and waits.

“How are you feeling after this morning’s unpleasant surprise?”

“Which one?” Kei asks, saccharine, and Oikawa smirks. Kuroo has yet to meet his eyes. “I’ve never been better,” he tells them through a smile that’s all teeth, and disappears into the storage room.

He takes two steps in and – fucking brilliant.

Kei reappears, aware of the anticlimax but unwilling to be an actual fool. “Detectives!”

They wheel around sharply and stride forward when they see him standing back in the corridor.

“What, what is it?” Kuroo barks, pulling Kei back with a hand around his bicep and the other on his hip as Oikawa darts to the door.

“A lock’s been tampered with on a cabinet at the far end,” he tells them tightly.

Kuroo’s exhale is warm against Kei’s ear. “Thank god it’s not another body,” he says, squeezing Kei’s hip gently –

He’s squeezing Kei’s hip, arm around the small of his back and hand warm and strong and separated from Kei’s skin only by the inadequate barrier of his suit trousers.

Kuroo understands the tension turning Kei rigid instantly and lets go like he’s been burned, stepping a good metre back as Kei fights his traitorous heartbeat. Oikawa, kneeling in front of the cabinet with the dented lock, throws Kuroo a truly exasperated look as he tells him to go get forensics, you useless excuse for a bad hair day.

His partner obeys, pouting.

“Looks like we’re going to be commandeering this room, too, four-eyes,” Oikawa says, straightening. “At least this might be the lead you wanted to get out of inventorying five hundred and sixty-four objects.”

“Fuck my life,” Kei groans, pinching his nose.

Hitachi and some of her team hurry over. “Has it been broken open?” she asks, crouching down to examine the drawer. Whoever it was must have used some kind of sharp tool; the flimsy outer casing is deeply scored around the keyhole. Kei watches her, heart in his throat as Hitachi holds the small knob handle as close to the wood as she can and tugs.

The drawer doesn’t open, and Kei exhales long and careful. “Thank god,” he murmurs under his breath.

“It doesn’t look like they got in,” Kuroo says quietly. “Hitachi, dust it and then Tsukishima-san can open it to check the objects. Tooru, the press conference.”

Oikawa gives him a very dirty look but nods, slipping out of the room.

“I need coffee,” Kei tells the room at large, even though he’s desperate to get his hands on the disturbed drawer to check on his collection. “I’ll be back in five minutes. Do you need my keys?”

“Just in case,” Kuroo says, holding out his hand. They still haven’t looked directly at each other, and his hand is flat, palm up, no danger of brushing Kei’s fingers as the keys change hands. Kei pointedly drops the keys from a good ten centimetres up and fucks off to the nearest vending machine to buy coffee. He can tell the Board about this _after_ the press conference. No need to get everyone worked up; the more demands made of the police the longer it will take forensics to clear the area and Kei needs to get to work, images of empty storage cases flashing before his eyes.

What if this was a heist, and Tsubasa was in the wrong place at the wrong time? What if half his storage collection has been stolen? Priceless artefacts of immense historical importance, vanished into the night. Saito can spin the safeguarding of objects into a clever tag line all he wants, but that is what museums exist to do and Kei has failed in his duty to preserve the lost yesterday for tomorrow.

The chirp of his phone brings him out of his worst-case scenarios whirlpool. Praise be, at first glance Matsumoto doesn’t think anything been taken from the classical storage, and says that Kida doesn’t think he’s missing anything from the Edo workroom but is about to start his own stocktake. Ryuugazaki, who curates Coptic and early Christian history, also seems confident her collection is in one piece. The other departments probably won’t have to stocktake their own collections unless they feel it necessary, but he’ll no doubt hear about anything unusual sooner rather than later.

Kei finishes the last of his coffee and tips his head back against the wall. Tetsurou always had the knack of finding and releasing the knots in his neck, but Kei doesn’t have any right to Tetsurou’s hands on him anymore, even if the ghost of the grip on his hip still lingers.

Officer Kindaichi fetches him again once forensics are finished, and Kei crouches down with Hitachi to his left, Kuroo over his shoulder, and a printout of the objects located in D4.2.1 in his hand. His returned keys are useless thanks to the twisted metal of the lock so he pulls on his nitrile gloves and improvises.

“You didn’t see me doing this,” he advises, unlocking the drawer beneath the one they need and unhooking it carefully from its tracks. He places it on the trolley he borrowed last week from Kida and leans back down to get his arm into the cavity.

Bracing his shoulder under the near edge closest to the lock and his palm at the back, Kei shoves upwards at both points simultaneously while pulling forward. With a crunch and a twang, the bar of the lock pops out of the groove and the drawer jolts free in his grip.

“Well done,” Kuroo says, sounding amused.

“Thank god,” Kei says again, ignoring him. All thirty scarab amulets are nestled securely in their foam beds. He traces a finger over each quickly and carefully, and then lifts the tray up and sets it aside to reveal the one underneath. “Thank god,” he says again, stroking reverently over all the occupied hollows, faience and terracotta and anhydrite ushabtis cool under the nitrile.

“So does this help us?” Kuroo wants to know. “Not that I’m not relieved we don’t immediately have to worry about antiques on the black market.”

Kei can’t quite mute his _tch_ as he replaces the trays and the other drawer, leaving the broken one slightly open with a _Caution, Unlocked for Work_ sticker he keeps in his wallet. “It gives me something to keep an eye on while I work through the compactus files.”

“Are you sure that the compactus contents have any relevance to the investigation?”

It doesn’t sound like Kuroo’s provoking him – Kei is intimately familiar with that tone – but be doesn’t appreciate being questioned in his own goddamn workplace.

“Until you find video evidence of our murderer, forgive me if I cover all my bases,” he says coldly. “Do your job and I’ll do mine.”

“Wouldn’t that be harmonious,” Kuroo replies, as soft and sweet as Kei was sharp, and oh, he has to turn away to hide how that hurts. Damn him, _damn him_.

“Hitachi, I want your report as soon as possible. Kindaichi, you’re with me. Thank you for your cooperation, Tsukishima-san.”

Kei doesn’t turn around to watch him leave.

* * *

It’s mid-afternoon before Kei finally gets the all-clear via Officer Kindaichi to enter his workroom again. The detectives have been pulling people into interviews left, right and centre, and security has been swarming like termites after their mound has been kicked. About time, Kei thinks, as he watches Kyusabe march around with a face like a thundercloud. For their security to have been shown to be this lax...heads will roll.

He keeps his own down and tries his best to get on with things. His three-person team has at least made some headway with the stocktake, but he really needs to get back into his office.

Nanase trots behind him as Kei hurries to the workroom and they both pause on the threshold despite themselves. It’s not quite how they left it, but the body is long gone and the blood has been cleaned up. There are still forensic markers dotting the space and black fingerprint dust is rife on every surface, but maybe now Kei can begin putting things back to the way they were.

“Yoo hoo,” Oikawa trills from behind him, and Kei suddenly believes in the supernatural because he is quite seriously contemplating more homicide in this already profaned space.

“Begone, foul dwimmerlaik,” he says, exhausted, and then Nanase squeaks and foreboding trickles up Kei’s spine.

“Oh, uh, Kuroo-san! I didn’t – I didn’t know you were here!”

Wonderful. Nanase has met Kuroo before, when he dropped by on quiet days to steal Kei away for lunch; he’s probably the only person who knows what a clusterfuck this is capable of turning out to be.

“Nanase-san,” Kuroo says impassively. “Could we talk to your boss for a moment, please?”

“I was rather looking forward to setting things in order,” Kei says, finally stepping into the workroom.

“We won’t take up much more of your time,” Oikawa assures him with a smooth smile, sailing past him and swiping what must be a master keycard past the reader at Kei’s door.

Mother _fucker_.

“Nanase, please check the bibliographical information on the network drive for our latest acquisitions, and order more reference books from the library if we need them.”

“Oh, uh, yes, sir.” Nanase scurries off, staring over his shoulder.

Kei takes a breath and steps into his office behind the two detectives, keeping a firm hand on his temper. “How can I be of assistance?”

“Is there anything immediately out of place?” Oikawa asks.

“Apart from what the forensic team disturbed?” Kei replies just as sweetly. Oikawa simply gives him a look, and Kei grits his teeth as he turns to survey his office, glancing to the left just in time to see Kuroo tearing his gaze away from Kei’s desk.

Vicious satisfaction floods Kei. Read ‘em and weep, you bastard, he thinks. Replacing the pictures in two of the three small silver frames on his desk was one of the first things he did, and now Tadashi and Hitoka’s wedding photo, Kei and Kiyoko standing to either side the bride and groom, sits in between the five of them graduating high school and the day the first building designed to Akiteru’s blueprints was opened, both brothers in navy suits.

He physically digs his glasses into the bridge of his nose to centre himself. Now is not the time for petty one-upmanship. _Be_ _a_ _professional_.

“I don’t believe so,” he says, striding to the box containing the new ushabtis and opening it. The four stylised figurines are where he left them, dusted in fingerprint power but their blue-green faience undamaged. “Did you find anything on the security cameras? Did security record any swipes coming into my office?”

He turns in time to see the detectives share a look.

“What?” he asks, sharper than he meant to.

“We’ve talked to security,” Oikawa answers. “The swipe card used to gain access to the workspaces through Gallery One belongs to Ohira Mori but your office registered and declined the swipe.”

“It would have,” Kei says, frowning. So someone did try and get into his office. _Why_? “Ohira-san doesn’t have any business anywhere earlier than the 1300s. But he’s on sabbatical in America: he was invited to curate an exhibition on the Muromachi Period with the University of Massachusetts.”

“Indeed,” Oikawa says. “Which is the reason his general access wasn’t revoked.”

“So someone got their hands on it,” Kei muses, leaning on his desk. “If they entered the back corridors through Gallery One, then they must have been caught on footage. I assume they came in near closing time, wandered around, and then slipped in? There’s no way they would have escaped an alarm if it was after closing.”

“Got it on one, Tsukishima-san,” Kuroo says, neatly jolting Kei out of his contemplations and holding out his tablet. Kei takes it warily and sees the grainy footage of one of the cameras perched above the door in the main gallery, filled with an appropriate amount of samurai and ninja artefacts to entice children in further.

The time stamp reads 16:38 on Sunday and the gallery has only a few people still wandering around. Kei darts his gaze across the screen, trying to pick out anyone acting suspiciously, and finds somebody strolling towards the staff door that leads into the corridor connecting the conservation labs like they’ve every right to be there. From the back, Kei thinks it’s a man but he can’t be absolutely sure: the person is wearing jeans and a loose coat, with a knitted hat pulled low over their ears and disguising their hair. Whoever it is knows where the camera is, though, and when they tap their card against the reader and step through the door they make sure their back is to the gallery.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Kei says, handing back the tablet. “Why not do what he needed to then? What time was the janitor killed?”

“Our pathologist’s initial observations put time of death between ten p.m. and two a.m.,” Kuroo says.

“So why wait five hours, or could there be different people involved?” Kei asks, adjusting his glasses in frustration.

“A quandary indeed,” Oikawa says, clear as mud. “Where were you between the hours of ten o’clock Sunday night and two o’clock Monday morning?”

Kei opens his mouth and closes it, blinking rapidly, staring at Oikawa like he’s suddenly chosen to speak in French. It feels like he just missed a step descending a staircase, a jolt of free fall, the toppling shock of having a foundation disappear – but of course it is useless and ridiculous to be so surprised, so _hurt_. This is their job, and everyone is a suspect, just like he himself told Nanase. He found the body, after all, and this is his workspace. It would be a gross miscarriage of justice for any exemptions to be made in standard police practice.

“I –” he curses himself for having to clear the glass from his throat, struggling not to look at Kuroo. “I was at h – at my apartment. I had dinner around nine and spoke to a friend at ten.” Now it’s even harder not to glance at Kuroo, and he ends up staring at the neat knot in Oikawa’s aquamarine tie like it’s a rare artefact in need of analysis. “I’m staying in his apartment while he’s away and one of the lights in the bathroom blew. I wanted to know what bulb it was and if he wanted me to change it. I went to bed around ten-thirty.”

“And can anyone corroborate that?” Oikawa asks, and Kei understands now why Oikawa is leading this interview.

“No,” he says, trying to make his voice as cold and even and uncaring as he can as he stares defiantly into Oikawa’s eyes. “I was alone. But you can check with Nishinoya Yuu and confirm the phone call.”

“We will,” Oikawa answers, scribbling down Noya’s details. “Thank you, Tsukishima –”

“But what about _this_?” Kei demands, spreading his arms to encompass his office. “Tell me what is going on!”

Again, Kuroo and Oikawa glance at each other, a silent conversation between the two of them.

“Tsubasa’s murder must have something to do with my collection,” Kei continues, “or why kill him here? I’m sure you’ve already looked into his background; if it was a deliberate murder predicated on some personal misdeed of his, there’s almost no chance the murderer would have gone to the trouble of slipping through museum security to slit his throat while he was on the job.”

“You’re right,” Kuroo says. “It most likely does have something to do with the Egyptology collection.”

“Tetsu-chan,” Oikawa cautions.

“Tooru,” answers Kuroo in the same tone. “This is his collection, he has a right to know.”

Objectively, he’s correct. Subjectively, Kei refuses to be in any way flattered at the two detectives showing anything less than a united front with a suspect in the same room.

“So?” Kei demands.

“So,” Kuroo says, turning to face him, “we’re fairly certain our suspect entered the restricted staff area through the gallery in order to make his way unseen to the loading dock in the back. He unlatched the door and prevented it from fully closing so the alarm circuit was never activated.”

“Are you fucking serious?” Kei flings himself up to pace the small width of his office, incandescent. “How did security not see that? Is this a joke? Leaving the loading door open – the technical team should have noticed! They’re shipping out some art in the next few days, they should have been more vigilant!”

“Apparently it’s because there’s some art to be transported that security didn’t think to check the loading bay more closely. The CCTV cameras there are down too, have been for a few days. Seems like more than a few policies have fallen by the wayside,” Oikawa says.

“And now watch Kyusabe try and force everyone to have DNA tests taken and institute retinal scanners,” Kei snaps, squeezing the bridge of his nose. “I cannot believe this. So someone acquires an access card, walks in when they won’t be suspicious, and unlatches a door well away from any witnesses in order to come back later unseen. They must also have known the security guards’ rotation. So what were they after?”

“That’s where you come in,” Oikawa answers. “No pressure, four-eyes, but something in your collection does seem to be his target.”

“We’ll station an officer here overnight until this is resolved,” Kuroo adds. “The murderer might have gotten what he came for, but until we know for certain we can’t take any chances. There’s also the mystery of the locked drawer to take into account.”

“Tsubasa was killed in front of the compactus,” Oikawa continues. “Our forensic team thinks that due to the way the body fell he was facing the shelves. It’s likely he disturbed someone.”

“I knew it,” Kei says, twisting his fingers as he paces. “There’s nothing in here of significant resalable value. It must be something else. Why the compactus? Something in the files?”

A cold shiver ripples up his spin.

“What is it?” Kuroo asks, watching him.

Kei hesitates. “I don’t know if you’ve heard this already...”

“I very much doubt it,” Oikawa says. “If it’s something that makes you pause, rest assured no one else has been willing to bring it up either – unless it’s gossip about a colleague. We get that a lot.”

Kei turns to face them, making a conscious effort not to fidget. “A few years ago, before I was employed here, there was some...unethical collecting in the Chinese department that was swept quietly under the rug when the curator retired, ostensibly to spend more time with his family. It’s impossible that every single object in a museum has been excavated legally, but thanks to the conventions put in place in 1970 and 1995 which prohibit the illicit import and export of antiquities, museums are now required to do their due diligence and be sure new acquisitions haven’t been illegally excavated. Sometimes, though, the ownership trail gets very muddy, and sometimes donors can be chosen with wallet size in mind rather than proof of purchase.”

“And that’s what happened with the Chinese department?” Kuroo asks, not looking up from his scribbling.

“Probably,” Kei says. “This is more a whisper, something we all know about but no one mentions. Donors and sponsors are the lifeblood of a museum, after all. I’m sure that nothing of that nature has happened in this department while I’ve been assistant curator, and definitely not while I’ve been acting curator for the past four months, but as for my boss’ predecessor…I can’t be sure. Maybe I’m leading you on a wild goose chase, but it’s one of the only reasons I can think of for the murder to have happened in front of the files.”

He watches as Kuroo and Oikawa exchange a look. “I never think my day really feels complete without making some important middle-aged men feel very, very nervous,” sighs Oikawa happily.

“This will really put the cat among the pigeons,” Kuroo grins.

“Wait a second,” Kei begins before they can flick their hair out of their eyes and swan off to heckle the Board with their matching smirks and devastating suits. “I mean, go ahead, but if you want to find out what’s going on, there are over a thousand records that will have to be crosschecked. It’ll take weeks, and sometimes the paperwork just doesn’t exist!”

“Aren’t you just a party pooper,” Oikawa pouts.

“It’s not like we can’t bait a trap and wait to see who comes sniffing about in the meantime,” Kuroo points out. “I say we interview them.”

Before Oikawa can reply, Nanase hurries into the workroom and raps nervously at Kei’s door. He glances at the detectives and moves to open it when neither protest. “What is it?”

“Tsukishima-san,” Nanase says, swallowing, “where are the files for the four new ushabtis?”

Ice pours through Kei’s veins and for a moment he just stares, horrified, before his brain comes back online.

“False alarm,” he says over his shoulder, stepping back for Nanase to enter the office and walking to his desk. “Here. Why do you need them, Nanase? Is there something that hasn’t been uploaded into the drive?”

“There isn’t a digital copy at all,” Nanase says, wringing his hands. “I spent ten minutes going through all our prospective acquisition folders on the network drive but I couldn’t find them.”

Kei stares at him. “Hiromasa was working on that last week.”

“That’s what I thought!” Nanase takes the folder and starts leading through it. “I knew we had the hardcopy documents but I could have sworn you told him on Friday to start creating the object records and significance assessments.”

“I did.” Kei turns to his computer, drumming his fingers impatiently on his mouse as the welcome logo spins.

Behind him, Oikawa says, over the sound of pages being rifled through, “I don’t think we’ve spoken to anyone with that name.”

“Oh, uh, Hiromasa-san is a part-time registrar,” Nanase explains. “He’s responsible for the maintenance of our records, but only works Wednesdays to Fridays since the budget cuts.”

“It looks like he doesn’t fucking work at all,” Kei says coldly, clicking through the prospective acquisition files on the Egyptology network drive. “He should have imported the basic object-material-date-inscription at the very least.” But not only are the documents missing, there isn’t even a folder corresponding to the new accessions. Between Castle_Bequest2011 and Christie’s_OsirisStatue2016 is nothing but blank space where there should be Chisaki_Donation2019.

“I’ll get started on the files now and try to have an outline for all of them by the end of the day.”

“Thank you, Nanase,” Kei says, giving up the feeble hope the files have just been misnamed. “Make sure you go home on time, though.”

“Yes, sir,” he nods, and hurries off, folders clutched to his chest.

Kei turns back to the detectives and forces a polite smile, regretting his momentary loss of composure. “Apologies. As you can see, work here isn’t often straightforward, even without the added complication of a murder enquiry.”

“Paperwork is a universal curse,” Kuroo agrees, and Kei wishes he wouldn’t, wishes Kuroo would remain standoffish and aloof and not someone who understands him so well it makes Kei ache.

“I’m sure the finance department has his details, if you wanted to speak to Hiromasa,” Kei says, grabbing a few books on Ptolemaic inscriptions that he doesn’t need. “He hasn’t been with us for long, but he knows his way around the files if you wanted to see if he’s noticed anything.” He sets the books by his computer and opens one, skimming through it and glancing up at the detectives after a deliberate moment. “Is there any further assistance I can offer?”

Kuroo smiles blandly, tucking his notebook back into his pocket and buttoning his blazer like he hasn’t a care in the world. “We’re done,” he says, and strolls out the door.

Kei is sure that it was specifically calculated to hurt, and he wishes Kuroo wasn’t so brilliant at maths.

“We’ll contact you if we have any further questions,” Oikawa adds, and follows Kuroo out. Kei waits for the click of the workroom door to close before shoving the useless pile of books away and burying his face in his hands.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> La Petite Cups is my homage to one of the most sublime KurooTsukki fics/series ever, Jaywalkers. Love it!

Kei finally makes it back to Nishinoya’s apartment that night in an absolutely vicious temper. Not only did Kawashita come blundering through his workroom at five o’clock fiddling with things that had nothing to do with him, but Nanase only got through three files out of four, admittedly no fault of his own though that puts yet another project on Kei’s plate, and Amane misread a whole page of location data and they had to go over the same cabinet twice to fix the mistakes.

He'd succeeded in ushering everyone out of the door at five-thirty on the dot, only to face a minute of insolent disdain just barely hidden under a professional veneer from the officer sent to take first shift of workroom guard duty. Inuoka was one of Kuroo’s first trainees and clearly has no problem deciding on which side to lay blame.

No point crying over spilled milk. Kei’s done enough of that, and he’s sure the strength of his glare can now turn any dairy instantly sour. It’s a superpower of his.

Just because Kei is trying to channel the power of a thousand burning suns through his mind, doesn’t mean he treats his belongings haphazardly. His bag is taken into the lounge and left on the table. His half-empty lunchbox is unpacked in the kitchen; his phone left on the counter and his suit trousers, jacket, tie and shirt all hung up. Dressed in sweatpants and an old t-shirt, Kei is finally free to seize a cushion off the couch and wallop the sofa with it as hard as he can, as many times as he can, headphones clamped over his ears blaring some godawful electronic rap that has no redeemable qualities except for drowning out the thoughts in his head by making his eardrums ache.

Fucking piece of shit fucking butt-weasel chaotic goblin's dick of a day, fuck!

Chest heaving, Kei finally lets go of the poor flattened cushion, fingers aching, and yanks his headphones off to plug them into their charger. What a fucking day. If he had any taste for alcohol he’d drink, or, more accurately, if Nishinoya did, seeing as Kei’s staying here for the next three months while he’s touring the national circuit. Nishinoya phrased it as a favour Kei would be doing him, calling a fortnight after the breakup sounding as maniacally cheerful as ever, instead of what he suspected was Tadashi reaching out to Sugawara and his extensive network in order to make sure Kei at least had a place to mope that was nearby. Nishinoya and Hinata are the only ones from their old club to go professional with basketball, though Kageyama plays with the police team, but all their upperclassmen are still weirdly close.

Sugawara even dropped into the museum last week and dragged Kei out to lunch, tactfully making no mention of Kei’s absence at Tanaka and Kiyoko’s sports shop’s second anniversary dinner. Their actual marriage anniversary isn’t till October, which Kei remembers, unlike some other idiotic classmates.

So in the end he didn’t kick up too much of a fuss when Nishinoya asked him to housesit, especially since there weren’t any affordable apartments close enough to work that didn’t have some glaring structural defect. The decor isn’t exactly to his taste and the mugs and bowls are all arranged in a way that makes sense to a guy who’s 164 centimetres and not 192, but there’s a roof over his head and no long-suffering Tadashi to worry if he spends his weekends in bed trying to choose a song that won’t either make him bawl his stupid eyes out or throw his headphones across the room.

How hard can finding a suitable song be, anyway, Kei gripes to himself as he prepares a cup of coffee and raids the pantry for something to eat that isn’t canned mackerel and pineapple slices. Either the singer is weeping after their lost love dumped them, and Kei can only listen to things in that vein for so long before the awful guilt begins gnawing at him for his part in their breakup, or the song is about vengeful self-recovery and the wound isn’t nearly healed enough for that.

Things weren’t supposed to matter so much that they’d tear you apart if they went wrong, and if they did matter, if you finally took the risk and cared about it like Kei spent most of high school relearning how to do, you were supposed to have someone there to help carry the weight. You were supposed to matter to someone, and if you cared, when you cared, like Tetsurou said, there was supposed to be somebody there beside you caring too.

Kei slams the panty closed and leans his forearms against the door, shaking, trying to get his breathing back under control as he presses his face to his arms and his glasses into his face. He’s not going to cry, he is _not_ going to fucking cry, he’s done enough of that already. What was the point? If he's still here, if they didn't transfer, was any of it worth it? The fight, the hurt, the unbearable misery that keeps him up at night - it's all so fucking futile because Tetsurou’s still here and Kei's not there with him. Love is bullshit and life’s a bitch.

Well, at least Tsubasa doesn’t have that problem anymore.

Shit.

He should probably tell someone about that, before his head actually explodes.

“Tsukki!” Tadashi answers brightly and his wife calls a greeting from the background. “Just in time – what’s scarier, one horse-sized duck, or a hundred duck-sized horses? Hitoka thinks the massive duck, but I think that all those little horses with their creepy feet would totally be more terrifying!”

Kei flops down into an armchair, his bad mood neatly derailed. “What is _wrong_ with you two?”

“I like to think we’re expanding our knowledge of the hypotheticals,” Tadashi says. “Anyway, what’s wrong?”

“Why would something be wrong?” Kei asks, now second-guessing bringing more trouble to his oldest friend. “Clearly a horsed-sized duck would be more terrifying, have you seen the bills on those nasty bastards? One peck and hello, concussion. A well-aimed wing strike could also fracture bone.”

“Tsukki, don’t try and pull that on me,” Tadashi tells him, and Kei is suddenly gripped with the urge to confess he ate the last biscuit and blamed it on Akiteru when he was eight. That particular tone of voice Tadashi learned directly from Daichi himself, and it has the same effect on Hinata, with hilarious results.

“I found a dead body at work today,” Kei says.

“Like a new mummy or something?” Tadashi asks, sounding like he’s shoving crisps into his mouth. “That’s cool.”

“I found one of the janitors with his throat slit on my workroom floor.”

Tadashi chokes on his mouthful and starts trying to cough up a lung.

“It should be headline news,” Kei continues ruthlessly, “featuring a short snippet of our sharklike PR rep spouting some pacifying bullshit whipped up by the advertising team. I wonder how many catchy titles they’ll come up with. Body in the Museum is too simple; how’s One Mummy Too Many or Corpse Among the Coffins –”

“We’re coming over,” Tadashi interrupts, and hangs up.

Kei stares at him phone in disbelief and redials.

“So help me, Tsukki, you stay right there,” Tadashi commands and hangs up again. He doesn’t even pick up the third time.

“Fuck,” Kei says, tossing his glasses aside to scrub his hands over his face. “This is so lame, oh my god.”

Twenty minutes later, during which time Kei has stress-cleaned the bathroom and put on a load of laundry, the buzzer for the apartment complex goes off. Kei sighs and hits the button the open the main door, waiting like a wilting pot plant by the front door until Tadashi’s distinctive knock raps against the wood.

Kei sighs again and opens it – and attempts to slam it shut immediately.

“What the actual hell, Tadashi?” he barks, struggling to close the door as both Kageyama and Hinata put their shoulders to it.

“Sorry, Tsukki!” Tadashi chirps, not sounding very sorry at all. “But I bought takoyaki so please let us in!”

“No, go away!” Kei hisses, leaning his whole weight on the door and feeling his heels slip backwards as someone – probably Hinata, the little monster – flings themselves forwards. They’re asking for it: Kei abruptly steps back and all three of his annoying, meddling nuisances sprawl at his feet. Hitoka hovers behind them, smiling sheepishly with the food safe in her hands.

“Get off me, dumbass!” Kageyama snaps breathlessly at Hinata. “Your elbows are sharp!”

“Well, at least part of him is,” Kei mutters, stalking back into the apartment.

“Hey!” Hinata snaps. “I’m plenty sharp.”

“Like a spoon,” Kei agrees.

“Never mind that,” Kageyama says, shoving past Hinata and cornering Kei in the kitchen. “So, a dead body?”

“Kageyama,” Tadashi sighs, resigned. “We talked about this.”

“It’ll be yours soon if you don’t get out of my face,” Kei snaps, shoving his glasses up his nose with his middle finger.

“Let me get some bowls for dinner,” Hitoka hurriedly intervenes. “Then we can talk about it.”

“You’re the best, Yachi-guchi!”

“Only if Tsukki wants to,” Tadashi adds, nudging Kei gently with his shoulder.

“But, like, an actual dead body?” Hinata wants to know, already sitting on the counter and swinging his legs. “Not a mummy?”

“I heard about it over the dispatch,” Kageyama tell him smugly. “It’s definitely a murder. A janitor had his throat slit.”

“His name was Tsubasa Neito,” Kei says flatly, back to them as he fills the kettle. “I found him lying dead on my workroom floor with a slash in his neck and blood all over the ground.”

Silence falls.

“Sorry, Yachi-guchi,” Kei belatedly tacks on. “It’s R-rated.”

Then two little arms adorned in flower bracelets are hugging him tightly around the middle. “Are you alright? It sounds awful, I can’t imagine having to face such a shock! I think my heart would just go _bllluhghgnhg_! All the blood, oh my goodness, and a dead body, just – just – lying there! What are you supposed to _do_? I’d die on the spot!”

“Oh. Yeah. My bad, asshole,” Kageyama mutters grudgingly.

“Stupidyama and Sulkyshima,” Hinata says with the air of one pointing out the obvious. “The kettle’s going to overflow.”

So it is. Kei turns off the tap and pats one of Hitoka’s hands. “I’m fine. It was a bit of a shock, but there was nothing I could do for him except call the police.”

“Who are the detectives on the case? The chief inspector’s still off sick, and a lot of the prefectural force is deployed south.” Kageyama’s probably running through the list in his head, and Kei grips the edge of the sink involuntarily. Hitoka seems to sense the tension in his back and loosens her grip.

“Oikawa and Kuroo,” he says, with what he considers admirable composure.

Hitoka gasps and flings her arms back around him. Tadashi drops an empty serving bowl, which clatters loudly on the floor. Hinata chokes on his glass of water. Kageyama, bereft of anything to drop to display his displeasure, settles for smacking Hinata across the back.

“So my day went well,” Kei concludes. “How did yours go?”

“Tsukki-kun,” Hitoka mumbles, clenching small fists in his shirt.

“Wow, dude,” Hinata says, around his coughs. “You really didn’t get lucky.”

“Well, I mean, they’re good,” Kageyama points out. “It could be worse.”

“Whatever it is,” Tadashi says, “it’s out of our hands. Come on, let’s eat before this gets cold and no talking about dead bodies over dinner!”

It’s no surprise Ennoshita recommended Tadashi replace him as captain, following Daichi’s proud footsteps of reining in the imbeciles. Hinata and Kageyama reluctantly help carry out the food to the lounge and Hitoka brings the bowls, chattering about the variety of fillings she ordered. Tadashi stays behind for a moment, watching Kei carefully as he loads a pot of tea and some mugs onto a tray.

“Tsukki,” he says softly, stepping closer, and Kei tenses.

“Shut up,” he hisses. “Do not make me start this right now, or I’ll never forgive you. I just need – I just need it to all go away, and then I’ll be fine.”

“Okay,” Tadashi yields, stepping away. “Sorry, Tsukki.”

“Whatever,” he says, picking up the tray. “Let’s just eat.”

The others are sprawled around Nishinoya’s low coffee table, couch pushed back to give them space, and Kei puts down the tray before he attempts to fold himself up enough to sit without knocking knees into anything or anybody.

“Pass me the octopus ones!” Hinata demands, and Kageyama puts two on his own plate before obeying.

“This reminds me of training camp!” Hitoka beams, looking at the TV cabinet in the corner where Nishinoya has several pictures of them all in high school. When she married Tadashi they were all so used to calling her Yachi that it became something of a challenge not only for them to remember, but for her to grow accustomed to answering to her married name. Hinata accidentally combined them one tipsy night and it stuck, mainly thanks to Hitoka’s delight at having a nickname all to herself.

“Hitoka, you say that every time,” Tadashi says adoringly.

“Because it’s true!” she says. “Don’t you think, Tsukki-kun?”

“Sure,” he says. “Same food, same idiots.”

He’s struck with the sudden desire for Akaashi’s calm level-headedness and Bokuto’s warm-hearted buoyancy. Not in spite of these friends, but maybe as well as. He hasn’t spoken to either one of them since he and Tetsurou broke up, except for answering Akaashi’s single text, _Do you have somewhere safe to go?_ with _Yes, thank you_.

“Remember that time Tanaka was like, _skebleuh_ _!_ and scared Asahi-san so much he went _wabam_ _!_ into the table?” As always, Hinata’s indoor voice is everybody else’s outside voice, and it drags Kei from his thoughts.

“Use your words, Hinata,” he says by rote.

“Yeah, I remember,” Kageyama answers through a mouthful, which Kei tuts at and is ignored. “Daichi-san got so mad at him.”

Kei hums agreement every now and then, staring down into his bowl and trying to swallow his mouthful as the rest of them chatter loudly around him. He’s never had a big appetite, had been more inclined in high school to slip his leftovers onto Nishinoya or Hinata’s plates when Sugawara wasn’t looking, but now, with this misery sitting high and solid in his chest, his appetite has almost completely vanished. Tadashi had threatened to force feed him soup a few days after he moved into their spare room, and even now the takoyaki is rubbery and unappealing in his mouth. Well, there’s that and then there’s the fact that the cold sauce left in the container looks an awful lot like congealed blood spilled in his workroom, pale dumpling gaping around its filling like a neck slashed open on the floor.

Kei succeeds in swallowing only to fear it’s going to come straight back up. He grabs hastily for his tea and gulps it down, forcing himself to tune into the conversation –

“Why wouldn’t Sasuke be able to have Naruto’s baby?” Hinata demands, incensed. “If the red spinny eye can turn into the purple one and create pocket dimensions, he could just grow the baby in there!”

– and tunes right the fuck back out.

“Seriously?” Kei says. “Right in front of my salad?”

“But Tsukishima,” Hinata says, big brown eyes as wide as damn Bambi’s, “you’re not eating a salad.”

Kei stares at him. Sometimes, oh those rare sometimes, he truly wonders whether Hinata is really an idiot, or whether he’s so dumb he’s actually come out on the other side of wisdom.

“Have some more tofu, Tsukki-kun!” Hitoka chirps, adding two squares onto his still-uneaten pile.

“Thanks,” he says, unwilling as ever to really dampen her enthusiasm. He manages to eat one, at least, and to drink some more miso. He’s lost weight, he knows he has, turning his already lean frame into something composed only of edges and angles.

Had Tetsurou noticed, when he’d gripped Kei’s hip? Had he seen, had he felt, had he cared? Does he avoid certain clothes, does he visit different places, has he noticed Kei’s absence at all?

Enough. It’s over. He was the one who moved out, took that definitive step. Kei stabs his chopsticks down through a piece of tofu hard enough for Kageyama to glance askance at him and takes a determined bite.

He regrets it almost immediately, but gathered around him are the four people who are most likely to notice if he tries to avoid eating, wise to his habit of chasing food around his bowl in an attempt to make it look less full. Tadashi is watching him now, too, concerned eyes soft in his freckled face. Married life is treating him well, and Kei is so happy for his best and oldest friend, and wants his and Hitoka’s happiness to go somewhere far away where he doesn’t have to see it.

Tadashi pushes some more tea over to Kei while Kageyama rebuts Hinata’s points with more gestures and _dumbasses!_ than are really necessary, and he succeeds in finishing the rest of his rice. That has to be good enough for his mother-hen friends; if he tries to eat more Kei thinks he’ll actually vomit, and no one wants to take that particular crown away from Hinata.

It is a Monday, though, and they’re all in their mid-twenties now with actual jobs and actual responsibilities. Hitoka starts yawning around nine, and they begin to clean up. Kei won’t tell them how grateful he is for their white noise chatter, which is sometimes just enough to drown his thoughts out and sometimes just enough for him to want to speak and drown his friends out, but he hopes they know, especially when he shoves slices of last week’s I-haven’t-eaten-in-a-day-and-my-colleagues-are-morons cake into their hands to take home for dessert.

Tadashi at least knows even without needing the cake, and Kei submits to a hug as they mill about the front door. Kageyama punches him in the shoulder, mutters something about Kei calling if he needs a better cop, and stalks out. Hinata bounds after him, waving at Kei and calling him Suckyshima, baring his teeth. Oh, so that’s what the babble about mirrors and garlic was. Kei likes to think if he was a vampire, he’d avoid them like the plague for fear of catching idiocy.

“You will call if you need anything, though, right?” Tadashi asks, slipping his arm through his wife’s to support her as she wiggles on her boot.

“Between you, Akiteru, Sugawara and my actual mother, I think I’m good,” he replies dryly, and waves them off.

Nothing left to do but gather his things for tomorrow, put the dishwasher on, and get changed for bed, where he lies for what seems like endless hours, headphones on and counting chord progressions so the prickling in his eyes doesn’t well over.

 _Love of my life,_ Freddie Mercury croons wistfully, _you’ve hurt me._..

Nishinoya’s spare futon is old and small, and Kei tells himself that’s the only reason it’s so, so hard to get a restful sleep that night.

* * *

He wakes up, gritty-eyed and heavy-headed, to texts from the few high school and university friends who know he works at the City Museum, all variations on the same theme after the broadcast last night. They probably don’t know he was the one who found the body; if they did, Daichi's and Suga’s texts would both be a lot more forceful. As it is, both offer assistance if he needs it, as does Tanaka. Nishinoya’s message is nearly incomprehensible with the amount of emojis he uses, but it coaxes a grudging smile out of Kei.

He has no doubt they’ll all find out eventually: Hitoka will mention it to Kiyoko over lunch, and she will tell Tanaka, who’ll tell Noya and Daichi, who’ll tell Sugawara, and then Kei will be faced with all of them bombarding him with commands to eat, sleep, take care of himself, get back into their old basketball workout. Maybe he can move overseas and change his name, or would the police find that too suspicious?

His university friends offer similar types of assistance, most asking, half-joking and half-serious, for reassurance that he wasn’t the one murdered or the one who did the murdering. Morons.

Uzumaki-san left him a voicemail last night, sounding frantic, though whether that’s because she’s concerned about the collection or because of the infant squalling in pitches only dogs are supposed to hear in the background, Kei doesn’t know. He emails her as many reassurances as he can, wondering if his chances of promotion have gone the way of Ancient Egypt. She’s a good boss, though, and a good curator; hopefully this won’t count against him, especially if they can sort it out as quickly as possible and the collection remains intact.

Akiteru texts, as does his mother, but the former has two blueprints due today and can be fobbed off with several unimpressed gifs, and his mother goes off on a tangent about crime rates in big cities which is easy enough to handle, since she worries about them both in this vein three times a year.

It’s the last text he gets while forcing down some unappetising leftover rice and miso – he really needs to go shopping – that gives Kei pause.

Akaashi [07:25]>> _I heard about you finding the museum janitor_. _You can tell me you’re fine but I won’t believe you._

Fine with what? The body, or Kuroo? Knowing Akaashi, probably both.

Kei stares down at his phone on the counter and reads the message for the third time as he listlessly ties his tie. He’d met both of them through Tetsurou, around the time he and Tetsurou started dating. Kei had only had a few casual relationships throughout university and once he met Tetsurou, that was it, compass aligned to magnetic north; he’s unfamiliar with breakup etiquette. Should his ex’s best friend’s partner be messaging him – and, more importantly, be concerned about him? The movies aren’t shy with their depiction of friends turning on exes. God, he has no idea what he’s doing and there’s nothing that infuriates Kei more than that.

Almost makes him wish he hadn’t broken up with Tetsurou, just to avoid all this. Ha.

Kei shoulders his bag, shoves his feet into his shoes, and stalks out of the front door. He doesn’t text while walking down the stairs, because only morons like Hinata do that, but once he’s squished in among commuters on the train, he stares down at his phone and misses the companionship the four of them had had, Bokuto and Tetsurou loud and bright, and himself and Akaashi following along in their wake only playing at reluctance.

Kei [07:44]>> _It was a shock_ , _but I’ll be fine once the investigation is complete_.

Is that too terse? He’d taken to Bokuto much more than he thought he would, the first time Kei had met him, but Akaashi was calm and quiet and absolutely ruthless, and once Akaashi and Bokuto had moved back to the city he and Kei had met for coffee at least once a fortnight religiously to throw shade on life, work, humanity and their lovers indiscriminately.

Kei [07:44]>> _Thank you_. _How are you_?

Akaashi [07:46]>> _I’m sure it was_. _But you know you have friends who will help you, incapable though some people might be at reaching out. Trust the police to do their job._

There’s nothing quite like caffeine and a dose of passive-aggressive snark to brighten your morning, Kei thinks, rolling his eyes at his phone. It vibrates again in his hand.

Akaashi [07:47]>> _We’re well. Bokuto’s been invited to a prospective Olympics training camp later in the year. La Petite Cups changed their menu._

 _Blasphemy_ , he types, and then pauses. Types out _give Bokuto my congratulations_ , then backspaces. _Tell Bokuto_ and deletes that. God, this is horrendous. He’s never walked on eggshells around Akaashi before, and wishes he didn’t have to now.

Kei [07:49]>> _Blasphemy. Congratulations to Bokuto; I look forward to Tokyo 2020_.

He shoves his phone into his pocket as they pull into his station. It vibrates in his pocket a moment later, but he leaves it.

Apparently the Board of Trustees has never heard of the expression, ‘closing the stable door after the horse has bolted,’ although to be fair most of them haven’t stepped out of the concrete jungle long enough to ruralise. Luckily they sent out a warning email in time telling staff to approach from the rear; there are perhaps a dozen media representatives hovering in front of the main steps ready to pounce.

Once Kei circumnavigates that gauntlet, he has to offer his identification to the uniformed constable outside the staff entrance and the one inside the main foyer, swipe his access card into security, sign in with the guard at the booth, and only then can he retreat to his work room. There he still has to confirm his identity with and then dismiss the constable stationed outside, and it isn’t much past eight in the morning.

“For god’s sake,” Kei snaps, flinging his bag onto his desk. He checks his phone to find Akaashi’s message only reads, _Thank_ _you_ , shoves it back in his pocket, and warily picks his office phone when it rings only to sigh in relief at the news a technician is coming down to fix the drawer lock.

He meets the man at the door a minute later.

“Good morning, Sohma-san,” he says. “Thank you for coming.”

“Good morning, sir,” Sohma says, hefting his toolbox. “Which way to the lock?”

Kei takes him to the next room and sits at the work table with his phone while the technician mutters to himself and coaxes the damaged lock out of the wood, tools laid out neatly beside him. It takes about five minutes, but soon Sohma is standing and Kei is testing his keys in the new lock. The drawer smoothly clicks open and rolls out on its tracks.

“Thank you very much,” Kei says, sighing in relief as he locks it again. “I appreciate your quick response.”

“Pleasure, sir.” Sohma gathers all his things. “When Reizei-san tells you to go somewhere and be quick about it, you go.”

Kei smiles a little at that and watches him leave before returning to his workroom to try and put it back into order in the half-hour he has left before the horde descends.

Nanase arrives just as Kei recommences his evaluation of Bay Ten.

“Morning, sir,” he huffs, unwinding his scarf from around his face. “The cameras are so intimidating!”

“You did come in from the back, didn’t you?” Kei asks, sticking his head out of the stacks.

“Yes, but they were still terrifying!”

Kei grunts agreement, ducking back into the compactus. Nanase clears his throat a moment later in that particular pitch where he wants to say something but can’t quite work out how, and Kei looks up to find him offering a large tightly-lidded thermos.

“I hope I’m not overstepping,” Nanase says nervously, “but I thought maybe this would help.”

“Oh. Thank you.” Kei reaches for the thermos, sips cautiously at the contents and smiles at the taste of his favourite brand of coffee. He thanks Nanase again, and the man’s shoulders drop in a sigh. Honestly, is Kei really that intimidating? He knows the answer is often yes, not that he often puts in the effort to appear otherwise, but Nanase, as Kei’s mother might say, is rather highly-strung.

“I hope Inspector Kuroo won’t bother us for too much longer,” Nanase adds, and Kei’s fingers tighten around the cup. “I know it’s not the same but my sister ran into her ex-boyfriend at work and she nearly cried in front of her boss. Hopefully soon they’ll catch whoever did this and you won’t have to see him again!”

Kei freezes.

“I’ll continue working on the donation documents for the ushabtis,” Nanase says, oblivious to the whirlwind inside his boss’s head, and darts off to a computer.

Why hadn’t that even crossed Kei’s mind? Obviously once the investigation was complete the police would retreat, obviously he and Tetsurou wouldn’t have anything further to do with each other; that was what it meant to break up. It was a splitting of lives, of directions, of futures. He’d known that in the abstract the last time he left their apartment with two suitcases in hand and his things in the back of Tadashi’s car, but faced with someone else utterly unconnected using that to reassure him...

I might never see Tetsurou again, he thinks, weighing every word, and icy panic grips his lungs.

The office phone rings, loud and sudden in the silence, and Kei startles enough to shake himself out of his head. “I’ll answer,” he tells Nanase, and picks up the handset.

“Egyptology, this is –” he begins before Otori is talking over him.

“Tsukishima-san, the Board of Trustees requires every employee to attend a general meeting at nine in the conference room. Fujioka-san would like it known attendance is mandatory.”

“...thank you, Otori-san,” Kei says. “We’ll be there.”

Fujioka is the head of the legal department. Kuroo wanted the cat among the pigeons, Kei reflects. Now it seems feathers are flying, and Oikawa was right: he did make some important middle-aged men very nervous.

He relays the news to his team as they arrive and watches each of their faces fall. There are already whispers in the corridors about the body in their workroom; packing all the museum employees into the main conference space is going to be an excellent way to start the morning.

True to Kei’s predictions, the staff already assembled by the time the Egyptology department arrives at 8:56 – Kei likes to express his displeasure at being micromanaged in small and subtle ways – fall silent before another wave of whispers crests and washes against them.

“Heads high,” Kei reminds his team, leading by example as he strides in. “We haven’t done anything wrong, and we’re still the third most popular exhibit.”

Fujioka leads the Board of Trustees in at 9:04 with Kawashita on his heels. The president’s toupee is slightly off-centre, and Kei can see at least four people for whom a misaligned frame is a nightmare wince.

“Good morning and thank you for making time in your busy work day for this meeting,” Fujioka begins, suit pressed into lines sharp enough to match the expression in his eyes. “As you are all no doubt aware, yesterday morning the museum was rocked by a sudden and unexpected tragedy – a janitor was killed in the Egyptology department’s workroom.”

He politely waits for the susurrus to subside, the Egyptology staff facing forward with chins high as people crane on tiptoes to stare.

“Nevertheless,” Fujioka continues, “we must move forward. As you can see, the museum has opened to the public again and we shall continue to provide the city with insightful, meaningful glimpses into humanity’s past to better inform the future. That being said, we must all remember that no information regarding the museum and its operations may be distributed without permission to members of the public, including the media. Anyone found to be sharing such confidential matters will face severe repercussions up to and including termination of employment.”

Kei has several years’ experience filtering bureaucracy, and he allows his mind to wander over the tasks they still need to complete as phrases occasionally register in Fujioka’s odd staccato rhythm: _strategic core values...maintaining the sanctity of donor details...acting with integrity...commitment to workplace policies...referral of relevant matters to appropriate departments_...

Basically, upper management is trying to close the stable after another horse has headed for the hills – the underlying message seems to be, don’t offer the police anything more than is strictly required. They must really be worried; what on earth did Kuroo and Oikawa ask the Trustees?

Just when Kei finds himself battling a yawn, Fujioka dismisses them – all except for the Egyptology department. Of course. Once the room is cleared they get a personalised version of the same speech rehashed face-to-face, and Kei has to nod and look convinced and grit his teeth until they ache as Fujioka tells them not to talk to the police without telling them explicitly not to talk to the police.

“I’d like to find _him_ dead,” mutters Amane under his breath when they’re finally allowed to leave, and Hanajima smacks him while Kei pretends he didn’t hear.

“Right,” Kei says, clapping his hands as they enter their workroom. Amane and Nanase are still skittish in the space and crowd over to the right side even though every physical trace of the crime has been removed. “We need to continue with the stocktake. Hanajima, Amane, work in the storage room while Nanase and I finish the accession documents for the new donation. We can’t afford to have donors doubting us now, so the sooner we lock in the paperwork the better. If Detective Inspectors Oikawa and Kuroo return, please answer their questions politely and efficiently, and if they require further details send them to me. If anyone here harasses you about that, you may also send them to me.”

That at least gets grins out of all of them. Hanajima asks through hers, “Can we just send them to you anyway, sir? They’re really getting on my nerves.”

Amane stops staring at the floor by the compactus long enough to snigger, “We can’t overload Tsukishima-san, his powers run proportionate to the amount of coffee he drinks.”

“Don’t make me fire you,” Kei says.

“Please don’t hesitate on my account,” Amane says, playing with his ID lanyard. He gets a smack across the back of the head from Hanajima for that.

“I would be more than a little dissatisfied to find anyone’s resignation on my desk,” Kei tells them.

“Oh, sir,” says Amane, clasping his hands over his chest, “you _do_ care!”

“Out,” Kei says, and if he lets them see his smile no one outside Egyptology will believe them.

When he and Nanase are alone, he turns to his assistant. “Keep going with the ushabti donations. I’ll be in my office.”

“Yes, sir,” Nanase says, and boots up a computer.

What the hell was in CB10 or CB11 that drove someone to murder? What sleep Kei did manage to snatch last night was dotted with visions of long corridors and piles of files, people in cabinets without labels and Tetsurou just out of reach. Thanks, subconscious, really on the nose right there.

“Get a grip,” Kei mutters at himself, crossing to his office to unearth his planner from a desk drawer. He can’t just dive in without knowing what he’s looking for. Last week wasn’t anything special, apart from actually getting their hands on the physical objects from Chisaki, who’s rumoured to be a mob boss but was calmly pleasant and well-dressed despite his germaphobe tendencies. Still not as bad as Kageyama’s antisocial acquaintance in the forensic accounting division, though.

But the donation was something they’d been discussing for several weeks, and he’d gathered some preliminary data and comparison artefacts to confirm Chisaki’s information about date, material and provenance. He’d inherited them from his godfather, who’d bought them from Sotheby’s in the sixties. Before that, they’d been in a private British collection; as provenance went, that was as good as it could be, with the original invoice from Sotheby’s included in Chisaki’s documents. The physical objects had been what he’d expected them to be from photographs and catalogue descriptions. All that the donation was waiting on was Kei’s team’s preparation of documents confirming the usefulness of the artefacts to their collection and their own due diligence checks on platforms like the ICOM watchlist.

Paperwork, future exhibition planning, conservation, database maintenance, education and outreach with the community...nothing out of the ordinary. What prompted someone to sneak in afterhours and search the workroom?

“Sir!” Nanase calls as he hears the workroom door open. It had better not be anyone from legal –

In a way, Oikawa and Kuroo are technically from legal, but not really. Kei schools his face into something neutral as he opens his office door.

“You’re doing wonders for my department’s reputation,” he says as a greeting.

“Is that so?” Oikawa asks, strolling inside.

“You should have heard the company-wide speech this morning.” Kei closes the door behind them. “It was only lacking in fire and brimstone to make it a commandment.”

“Oh, so management are scrambling to cover their asses?” Kuroo asks, propping his shoulder against a bookcase.

“It was a precisely-worded bureaucratic treaty on not talking to the police and I’m surprised they haven’t sent a lawyer down here already. What on earth did you say to the Trustees?”

Kuroo and Oikawa look like cats who’ve finished their dish of cream. “Yes, it’s all very well you looking smug, but it’s really quite a pain for me,” he tells them, folding his arms and staring down his nose at them.

Kuroo at least has the grace to look a little sheepish, but Oikawa of course tilts his head right back at Kei.

“Do you at least have _a_ lead?” Kei asks, sitting back down at his desk.

“Several,” Oikawa says. “Have some faith, four-eyes.”

“I’ve seen you with glasses too,” Kei retorts before he can think better of it.

“I have excellent vision,” Oikawa sniffs. “I just need a little focus for long distance.”

As an astigmatic, Kei hates him on principle. Still, if they’re not confirming or denying, they must be tracking _something_. “Do you think it’s likely they’ll try again?” he asks. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to wait for the interest to die down?”

“It would, but it would also increase the likelihood of us discovering what’s actually going on. With a weight like this on their shoulders, every choice, every action, is overshadowed by the body they left on the floor. A pebble’s been dislodged, and the mountainside is going to come down sooner or later. In most cases, it’s sooner.”

“Especially since murder is, in truth, easy,” Oikawa adds, crossing his arms and leaning against the bookshelf next to Kuroo. They look like _komainu_ , gatekeepers at the beginning and end of all things. Their eyes turn unfathomable, sharp and edged and bright like gemstones, the kind that inspires revolutions and regicide and bloodshed on a battlefield. “The human body, for all its resilience, is hardly a well-armoured piece of machinery. A blade here, a twist there...once you’ve done it once, it hardly seems an effort to do it again.”

Kei stares at them, eyes darting between expressions that have turned...vicious, gleeful, _hungry_ ; not content with simply warding off evil spirits but hunting them instead. He’s obviously never seen Tetsurou on duty before, never been on this side of an investigation, and every inch of Kei’s body is telling him he’s facing two apex predators.

What does it say about him, then, that his stomach is suddenly fire? His lungs catch the sparks and send them coursing through his bloodstream; he wants Tetsurou so much his hands start to sweat and his ribs threaten to cave. He wants that formidable focus back solely on Kei where it belongs.

“So, yes,” Tetsurou says, relaxing as the moment of tension snaps with a near-audible twang. He flicks his fringe out of his face, shrugs, crosses one ankle over the other. The dogs of war are firmly leashed back under his control like the previous moment never happened. “It’s likely the murderer will try again.”

Released from the microscope of their gazes, Kei exhales with careful deliberation and wills his heart to slow as Oikawa begins fiddling with the stapler. They broke up, this is his _ex_ , and he needs to get a fucking grip. This is a murder investigation, and then Tetsurou will go on his merry way.

“Are you looking somewhere in particular?” He sees them glance at each other and clicks his tongue in annoyance. “I’m not asking you to tell me who or what, just that you are.”

“We’re pursuing several lines of enquiry,” Kuroo says calmly.

“And might I ask what brings you back here, apart from bringing management’s wrath down on me once more?”

“We actually came to talk to Nanase,” Oikawa says.

Kei stares. “I’ll call him in,” he says eventually, once it becomes apparent neither detective will say anything else.

Nanase looks petrified. “M-m-me?” he stammers, tottering over to Kei’s office.

“We’d just like to ask you a few more questions,” Oikawa says, clearly taking the lead as Kuroo fades into the background.

“Would you like to be alone, or would you prefer me to stay? Or should we ask one of Fujioka-san’s team to come down?” Kei asks quietly, ignoring the detectives.

Nanase plops down into Kei’s chair, white as a sheet. “Not Fujioka-san! Can – can you stay, Tsukishima-san?”

“Of course,” Kei says, glancing at Oikawa. He looks unconcerned, which is as much as they can hope for, and Kei sits on the edge of his desk.

“Now, we’d just like to go over your account of Sunday,” Oikawa says, sitting back on the table and pulling out his notebook. Nanase nods, weaving his hands tightly in his lap. Kei wants to tell him to calm down and stop looking so guilty, because just like airport security Oikawa will pounce on any show of weakness, but saying that will just make Nanase more nervous.

“I went to bed,” he says, watching Oikawa’s notebook like a hawk. “I always go to bed early on a Sunday.”

“Commendable,” Oikawa smiles. “And you were alone?”

“Y-Yes,” stammers Nanase. “My girlfriend works at the railway, last weekend was her rostered night shift.”

“So no one can confirm your whereabouts,” Oikawa says.

“N-no?”

“So we only have your word that you were at home, asleep, between the hours of ten that night and two early Monday morning,” Oikawa notes, writing something down. It’s probably just a doodle – the notation is to intimidate Nanase, not provide Oikawa with any extra details. Kei frowns at him, and then at Kuroo, who’s doing that ridiculous ‘fade into the background’ thing that should theoretically be impossible for someone 188 centimetres tall with hair like that and shoulders like _that_. He’s watching Nanase with a feline intensity that raises the hair on the back of Kei’s neck.

“I was,” Nanase insists.

“And earlier in the day? What were you doing that afternoon?”

Where are they going with this? Kei remains a still and silent support to Nanase’s left, and when Nanase glances at him he smiles encouragingly.

“Sunday afternoon? Uh, I, um, I think I did some laundry and went to the shops?”

“I don’t know,” Oikawa responds gently, “did you?”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure I did. There was a – a special on radish.”

“So you didn’t come back to the museum on Sunday afternoon?”

Kei forces himself not to react. Do they think _Nanase_ was the man in the security footage?

“No,” Nanase says, glancing at Kei again. “Tsukishima-san didn’t need any of us there, no one would have been in over the weekend.”

“So this isn’t you?” Oikawa asks, and hands over the tablet with the security footage. What are they _doing_?

Nanase takes it, hands shaking, and watches the two-minute loop. “No, no, of course not! I didn’t go to the museum on Sunday!”

“You didn’t let yourself in with someone else’s access card?”

“No! I have my own, why would I use someone else’s?”

“So you wouldn’t be caught,” Oikawa suggests softly, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

“No, I didn’t!”

“So why does Ohira-san say he left his access card with you?” Oikawa snaps, voice suddenly cold and hard.

“What?” Nanase yelps, jolting in his seat. He sounds so distressed Kei reaches out for his shoulder.

“Breathe, Nanase, it’s alright,” he says as soothingly as he can, glaring at Oikawa out of the corner of his eye. Kuroo moves – just a finger, but it’s enough to draw the eye after his previous stillness. He’s staring at Kei’s hand on Nanase’s shoulder, and he tightens it only a little out of spite. “Did Ohira-san leave his keycard with you?”

“I don’t – I don’t know,” Nanase says, running and hand through his hair. “Why does it matter?”

“It’s alright if he did,” Kei adds. “You were a registration assistant with his team a while ago, and he spoke highly of you.”

“I – maybe he did, yes, I think Ohira-san left his spare lanyard with me, since Reizei-san from administration got angry at him when he kept losing them.” Kei watches Oikawa and Kuroo glance at each other.

“Do you still have it?” Kei asks, something sinking in his chest.

“Yes, I think so,” Nanase says. “It should be in my locker in the staff room.”

“Show us, please,” Kuroo says, making Nanase jump as he steps forward.

“Now?” Nanase wilts. It’s nearing eleven; the more staff who see Egyptology in the company of the police the more likely legal will descend on them like a ton of bricks.

Kei grits his teeth but makes sure to keep his tone even as he squeezes his assistant’s shoulder. “It’ll be alright, Nanase. I’ll go with you, and if it’ll help settle some of the detective’s questions we should accommodate them as best we can, for Tsubasa-san’s sake.”

“Yes, sir.” Nanase leads the way out of the workroom, pale and twitchy but unfaltering.

The universe seems to have decided they’ve suffered enough for one day: there’s no one in the staff room, and the two people who did see them in the corridors are casual interns from geology. Nanase heads to his locker and unlocks it.

“It’s here, see,” he says, rummaging in the space, “I left it...right...here...”

Nanase trails off, and Kei doesn’t need to see the fear on his face to know what he’s going to say. “It was here!” Lunch box, outdoor shoes, empty thermos, pad of paper, mini first aid pack, sweater; everything is pulled out and spread over the staff room table. Kuroo moves forward to peer inside, and Oikawa looks over the mess.

“It was here, I know it was,” Nanase says despairingly, shaking out each item as he returns it to the locker like the card is in his lunch box or the fold of a sweater. “But why does it matter?”

“Because Ohira-san’s card was used to gain entry to the workspaces where the loading door was unlatched, allowing a murderer to slip inside unseen,” Kuroo states, voice very cold.

“W-what?” Nanase goes so pale Kei grabs him by the arms and steers him into a chair before he can faint. This has gone on long enough.

“Nanase had no part in that,” Kei snaps, facing down the two detectives. “The card must have been stolen from his locker, they’re not hard to open. Besides, several people knew Ohira-san had a habit of misplacing his keycards, including me.”

“Are you sure there’s nothing you would like to tell us about Sunday night?” Oikawa asks again, ignoring Kei.

“No!” Nanase whimpers. For god’s sake, he barely tops 160 centimetres and probably weighs 60 kilos soaking wet; Kei knows what Hinata can do but Nanase can’t even see a moth in the cabinet without screaming and then insisting it be released outside. “I was home, I swear, I didn’t do anything!”

“Of course you didn’t,” Kei says, grabbing his shoulder again. “I’m sure this is part of eliminating suspects from their enquiry.”

“Maybe you were just following orders,” Oikawa suggests helpfully, and it takes a moment for the implication to click, but once it does Kei is furious – and so is Nanase.

“Don’t talk about Tsukishima-san like that!” He’s got some colour back in his cheeks, at least. “He would never – and neither would I! Neither would anybody in the department! We’d never kill someone, especially not in our own workroom! How could _you_ even think that, Kuroo-san?”

Kuroo’s face is implacable, his eyes arctic. Kei pats Nanase’s shoulder before anything more personal can be thrown in accusation.

“Thank you, Nanase,” he says. “The detectives don’t really think we had anything to do with it. I’m sure they’re just following procedure – like we should be doing.” He wraps his hand around Nanase’s upper arm and pulls him easily to his feet. “I’m sorry to cut this short, detectives, but we have to get back to work. If you should feel inclined to speak to us again, please schedule an interview through Fujioka-san and the correct legal representatives of the City Museum and we shall endeavour to accommodate your request. Have a nice day,” he adds, as pleasantly as he can, and sweeps Nanase out of the door ahead of him.

Neither Kuroo nor Oikawa call them back, despite how the back of his neck prickles with tension.

 _That certainly could have gone better,_ the rational side of him notes.

 _Fuck!_ counters his irrational side.

He’s just walked out on the police, _h o l y s h i t_ Kei once told Daichi to shut up and it was the most terrifyingly rebellious moment of his life, but this probably wins in a photo-finish. He could make excuses for storming out on an ex but this is far more serious, he could be detained for this, oh my god Kei thought he had a better grip on his temper.

“Am I going to be arrested?” Nanase whimpers.

“No,” Kei says sharply, tearing his attention away from himself and his problems in favour of someone much less well-equipped to deal with life’s vagaries. “Without a warrant you can’t be, and if they interview you at the police station you have the right to a solicitor of your own choosing. They have no evidence against you. A missing keycard isn’t enough to charge someone with a capital offence.”

Nanase buries his face in his shaking hands as Kei steers him through the corridors to the relative privacy of his office.

“I’m so sorry!” he blurts as soon as Kei closes his door.

“What on earth are you sorry for, Nanase?”

Nanase wrings his hands. “I don’t know,” he admits. “That I lost Ohira-san’s keycard? That I couldn’t stand up for you more?”

Kei blinks, taken aback. “You don’t need to,” he says. “I’m your boss, not vice versa.”

“But still,” Nanase says. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I swear I didn’t have anything to do with Tsubasa-san’s death. Or the keycard. Or the security footage. I swear!”

“I didn’t think you had,” Kei says, pulling off his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose. “I’m sure the police were simply doing their job following a line of enquiry. It doesn’t have to be pleasant.”

He’s trying to believe his own words as he replaces his glasses. For god’s sake, Kei, he tells himself, you were the ridiculous idiot drooling over dangerously-competent Detective Inspector Kuroo ten minutes ago. Pick your kinks more wisely next time. You know how driven they both are. This is their job, _you_ are a job. Don’t flatter yourself that Kuroo will treat you any differently just because he was once in love with you. That ship sailed when you didn’t want to put the effort into fixing what broke between you.

 _...It’s not like you have time for me anyway!_ Tetsurou shouts in his memory, both of them red-faced and shaking, one of the many dirty dishes that had started the fight shattered on the floor between them. _Let’s not pretend you’ll commit to long distance if it means you have to actually try!_

 _Then I’m clearly wasting my time here,_ he’d shouted back, furious because the other option was bursting into tears. _If you’re not going to compromise for my job when that’s all I’ve ever done for yours, then maybe I’ll just go!_

_Fine!_

_Fine!_

Three years, over just like that. He’d cried his heart out anyway, so the delay hadn’t really had much of an effect. It was a miracle he hadn’t choked himself on all the broken pieces.

“...Tsukishima-san?”

He blinks back to the present, Nanase concerned and curious in front of him.

“I’m sorry,” he says automatically, “did you say something?”

“No, just...Uh, well, never mind. I’ll...should I keep working on the accessions?”

“Why not,” Kei sighs, dropping his hand and shoving all the chaotic emotions down into the back of his mind. “We might as well try and get something done today. If you don’t want to go out for lunch you can eat in my office away from the artefacts.”

Miraculously, they do finally finish the donation documents, undisturbed by any uniformed officer or lawyer coming for his head. Nanase seems to settle the longer they go without any interruptions, and Kei sends him to join the stocktake effort for the last few hours. He’s left to truck through his emails in peace, nursing a headache sitting obstinately behind his eyes.

_Dear Chisaki-san,_

_Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay in preparing the documentation to accept your generous donation of four (4) Late Period Ushabti figures. As I’m sure you’re aware, the City Museum was recently rocked by unforeseen misfortune. Please see the attached document from our Public Representative Saito Ritsu-san if you are in any way confused or concerned about the security policies of the Museum._

_Work has recommenced and all of us here offer our assurance that the artefacts are in safe hands. With regards to your donation, please see the documents I am appending and read through them carefully. If you agree with the information stated, as I hope you will after our previous correspondence on the topic, please sign the forms titled Notification of Donation and Declaration of Legal Transferral of Ownership, keep a copy for your personal archives, and return the originals to me._

_As agreed, we would be pleased to display the artefacts with the credit line, Donated by Chisaki, K, 2019._

_If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact me._

_Thank you for your support of the City Museum and the Egyptology Department. We look forward to working with you._

_Kind regards,_

_Tsukishima Kei_

_Acting Curator, Egyptology Department_

_City Museum_

_tsukishima.k@citymuseum.co.jp_

He hits send with such forceful satisfaction the mouse creaks and slumps back in his seat. He used to think he had an excellent bullshit detector, honed through three years’ close proximity to Hinata and Kageyama and four years of university, but this...his bullshit detector is still excellent and is still activated but what they don’t tell you about adulthood is that you’re no longer just detecting bullshit, you’re creating it. This is corporate jargon bullshit. This is next level, and why is adulting so difficult?

Well. That’s that done, at least. The files look complete, too. Kei opens the network drive and glances over the four folders. Nanase has left a post-it note on one of the hardcopy files, so Kei finds it and opens its digital equivalent.

Title: Ushabti (Funerary Figurine)

Material: Faience

Date: c. 700 – 353 BCE (Late Period)

Inscription: Typical Spell, 6th Chapter of the Book of the Dead. Deceased was Ankh-ef-en-Khonsu. Inscription in four (4) horizontal lines reads: _Hail, Shabti. If the Osiris Ankh-ef-en-Khonsu be decreed to do any of the work which is to be done in the Khert-Neter, let everything which stands in the way be removed from him; whether it is to plough the fields, or to fill the channels with water, or to carry sand from East to West. “Here am I,” you shall say, “I shall do it.”_

Provenance: Donated by Chisaki, K; by descent from Heiwajima, A; purchased from Sotheby’s 1963 (July Catalogue, Lot 78); British private collection prior to 1963.

Kei frowns at the inscription and stands to retrieve the physical artefact. Nothing seems wrong with it, so why did Nanase flag it for him? The hieroglyphs are a little worn and eroded down one side, but it’s still legible.

He spends the last hour scrutinising the faded glyphs and pouring over three works of ushabti dedications, hieroglyph dictionaries and comparison catalogues, and by the time his team returns he’s double-checked everything twice and all the translations are correct.

“We’re heading off, Tsukishima-san,” Hanajima calls. “We’re on the last hundred now, and nothing’s gone that we didn’t already know about. A few odd numbers, but we’ve made notes on that and I think they all match your odd list anyway.”

“Excellent, thank you,” Kei says, lifting his head and wincing as his neck protests. “I didn’t think anything had been taken, but it’s a relief to hear we were right. Go on, get home safely.”

“How about you, sir?” Nanase asks, and the team pauses.

“I’ll just be a moment,” Kei says, turning back to his computer. “About the ushabti, Nanase –”

“You could really do with some dinner,” Nanase persists, and he doesn’t have to look to know the team is staring at the odd defiance from their meek mouse.

“You know, Nanase-kun is right,” Hanajima says, and Kei knows the end is in sight. “This whole thing has been crazy, and you deserve an early night!”

“Go and get dinner, sir,” Amane adds. “You’re looking a bit pale.”

“It might not be safe, sir,” Nanase worries, and Kei throws up his hands.

“Alright, fine! Look, I’m coming, let me pack my stuff.”

He stands and his head throbs in warning: maybe his team is onto something. They at least don’t try and drag him out to eat dinner with them once the night officer has arrived – someone different, thank god – so Kei puts his headphones on at the front door and waves once before heading reluctantly to the store. By the time he returns to Nishinoya’s apartment with some instant noodles the headache has fully bloomed and his appetite is non-existent anyway.

 _Don’t forget to eat something!!!!_ Tadashi texts just as Kei shoves the groceries into the pantry. _Don’t make me tell Daichi-san!!!!_

Knowing someone for fifteen years is cheating, three out of ten, would not recommend. Kei eats his noodles while distracting himself humming the counter harmony to Coldplay, showers briefly, and climbs into bed with a blackout mask and a sleeping pill at eight p.m.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, forgot how many chapters I had! That's been updated from 4 to 5. Thank you so much for the incredibly wonderful support this story's gotten so far! You guys are amazing! Xxx <3 I hope the pacing works out and you continue to enjoy!

Wednesday dawns cold and grey, fog heavy on the tops of the buildings like it's weighing the world down. Kei doesn’t bother meeting his reflection’s gaze in the mirror as he brushes his teeth and makes sure to drink at least three cups of coffee to adequately prepare himself for either the day ahead or cardiac arrest, whichever comes first.

Running the security gauntlet is much like yesterday, except for the presence of Fukunaga at his workroom. Kuroo’s mentee when he himself was finishing his time in uniform, Fukunaga is another of the longest-serving members on Kuroo’s team, and Kei nearly balks at the sight of him.

“Good morning, Tsukishima-san,” Fukunaga only says, calmly professional as he steps aside. More than one person could stand to follow his example, Kei included.

“...Good morning, Fukunaga-san,” he replies, adjusting his glasses. “Nothing unusual?”

“No, sir. I’ll report in.”

“Thank you.”

The hieroglyph sheet with Nanase’s unexplained post-it note is still waiting for him on his desk, but Kei’s eyes are drawn once more to the compactus. Kuroo and Oikawa are working on the investigation their way, but Kei was so sure something in the shelves would be the answer when he first saw what was going on. Means, motive, and opportunity, he thinks, wheeling open the sixth row.

As loathe as he is to consider it – he mocks people in general but Kei doesn’t honestly go around thinking his colleagues could be capable of cold-blooded murder – the only people with motive, if there is something in the files, are the people in the Egyptology department. Four, including himself; their part-time registrar; Uzumaki, who’s been away for several months; Tanimoto, who’s their distant and often-forgetful supervisor in the finance department; Fujioka, who most likely knows most of what goes in and out of any department at any given time; and Matsuda, who represents the three ancient Mediterranean departments on the Board of Trustees.

Are any of them likely to commit murder? What for? But remember, he tells himself, burglary was the first option. Murder only happened because the thief was disturbed and probably panicked.

If there is something in the files, Kei reasons, picking up the nearest one and leafing through it, then it must be something someone doesn’t want coming to light. An illegal acquisition? That was his first thought. What prompted someone to come looking?

He’s just going round in circles. Kei sighs and leans his forehead against the cool metal shelf for a second, two, three, until the muted click of the workroom lock announces someone else’s arrival.

No one calls out, though, and Kei lifts his head as footsteps approach the compactus.

“Oh, fuck!” Hiromasa hisses, jolting and grabbing at his chest as he sees Kei standing between the shelves. Kei agrees, but has the composure not to show it.

“Good morning to you as well,” he says dryly, putting the files back.

“I didn’t expect to see anyone lurking in the compactus,” Hiromasa says, stepping back so Kei can walk out.

“What part of working counts as lurking?” Kei asks, frowning. “Never mind that, I have something to say to you. Why didn’t you work on the ushabti donation documents on Friday like I asked you to?”

Hiromasa looks puzzled. “The new acquisition? But you said you wanted to do them.”

“No, I said I wanted them done,” Kei says, crossing his arms. “I asked you to start on them, so imagine my surprise on Monday when Nanase said there weren’t any files on the department network drive.”

“Sorry, Tsukishima,” says Hiromasa, scrubbing at his stubbly chin. “I honestly thought you would do them yourself. I was working on finishing the upload of geographical metadata into the database, since the email from IT said the system would be down for maintenance over the weekend.”

Kei remembers skimming those emails, but the IT dates weren’t entered into the department calendar.

“But hey, how did yesterday go? And Monday? I heard what happened, that’s crazy! A dead body, here? And the police have no idea?”

Hiromasa drops his bag by one of the computers, turning eagerly to Kei. He watches paranormal videos on company time; no surprise he’d be on the inappropriate side of curious.

“I can’t comment on what the police do or don’t know,” Kei says repressively, closing the compactus. “But yes, the museum was pitchforked into something of a media disaster.”

The news reports are still coming in; Kei’s avoided most of the broadcasts but newspaper headlines still catch his eye on the train. The museum is alternatively the object of pity and disdain, concern for valuable cultural heritage items warring with a crucifying topical piece on security and negligence by one of the younger journalists crusading for organisation accountability. Kei rather liked it, but it’s more than his job’s worth to admit it. His email is being overrun by requests for comments, interviews, catchy sound bites, but at least Saito and Fujioka are taking control of everything media-related.

“Man, I can’t believe someone got in here! Do they know how? We’re supposed to have security!”

“The police haven’t seen fit to share that sort of confidential information with me,” Kei says, annoyed despite himself at Hiromasa’s fishing. “Kyusabe-san will probably know, if you want to ask.”

Hiromasa laughs, holding up his hands. “Me, ask that old bulldog about security? No thanks! So they really don’t know what happened? I had some detectives visit yesterday and ask me all sorts of things about where I was, and what I knew about the running of the office. Don’t worry,” he adds, seeing Kei’s face turn dark, “I didn’t say anything. What was I going to tell them, that you’ve been working late recently and moping?”

Kei dislikes several people, but in truth prefers to keep most of society at a comfortable distance using his height and an unapproachable neutrality. Actual hostility is rare for him, but Hiromasa seems to toe the line more often than not. The worst part is, he’s only technically under Kei’s authority. Hiromasa is from the administration department, rostered to a department to help with files and the database as required.

“You can tell them whatever you’d like,” he says coldly, “if it’ll help catch a murderer.”

Hiromasa deflates. “Ah, yeah, I forgot about that part,” he says. “Sorry, it’s just such a surreal concept. Like, I can’t believe you just walked in here and found a body.”

“Neither can I,” Kei mutters. “Look, Nanase and I had to finish the files on top of the stocktake. Please ask for clarification the next time something seems uncertain.”

“I understand. I’ll get on it right away.”

“No, just finish what you had to do with the pick lists,” Kei tells him, skirting the edge of a snap and reigning himself in

“Why stocktake, though?” Hiromasa asks, as Kei turns to his office.

“To make sure nothing was taken when the murderer broke in.” _Duh_ , he doesn’t say, and thinks he deserves a medal.

“Ah, right! Well, if you need me to help, just say the word!”

Kei leaves his door open in case Hiromasa has another brilliant idea that Kei’s going to have to shoot down. At least Kuroo and Oikawa did go and interview him, though god knows what Hiromasa actually told them. 

“Oh, uh, you’re back, Hiromasa-san. Good morning,” Nanase says when he arrives ten minutes later, already looking nervous. Ennoshita wheedled Kei into babysitting several of Hinata and Kageyama’s outings in high school; more fool Kei for thinking he’d be able to stop when he graduated.

“Nanase, keep going with the stocktake,” Kei calls through the open doorway.

“Yes, sir!”

“You’re looking more timid than usual, Nana-chan,” Hiromasa says, looking up from his computer. “Rough time with the police? Did they finger you for the crime? Something suspicious in your locker?”

“Hiromasa,” barks Kei.

“Ah, sorry! Don’t look so worried, Nana-chan! You know I don’t mean it.”

“Um, it’s alright...I’ll just go...check the objects...” Nanase mumbles, retreating in no short order right back the way he came.

“Please keep in mind appropriate language for the office,” Kei reminds Hiromasa icily.

The day doesn’t get better. At five past nine, Tanimoto calls, asking about timesheets that have already been validated and sent off for salary processing. At ten, Hanajima needs his help with a misplaced tray of amulets and they spend an hour looking with increasingly short tempers only for Hiromasa to call and say Yoshi from education had wanted to look at them and left the tray in the workroom.

At eleven, Kei nearly commits homicide himself, but goes to buy coffee from the vending machine farthest away from his department and talks himself out of it.

At twelve, he’s called into Matsuda’s office to give an account of stocktake – nothing missing that they didn’t already know about – and sits through half an hour of his boss bemoaning the inconvenience of a man losing his life in their department. On his way back down, Kei crosses the museum atrium just in time to see a couple admiring the armour a recent anime was modelled off and the man on the left with his arm around his partner has a shock of dark hair so similar the ever-present ache in Kei’s chest rears its head and _bites_.

He misses Tetsurou so much it hurts. Kei misses his smile and his smirk and his chaotic laugh, he misses his competitive temper and his good-humour and his calm empathetic good sense, he misses the way he’d kiss the back of Kei’s neck when they stood at the sink and the way his hand fit around Kei’s and even the way his feet would always be cold against Kei’s ankles.

God, he’d settle for seeing him only for Tetsurou to arrest one of his team right about now, preferably Hiromasa. The man slouches back into the office after lunch, laughing as he mocks someone over text.

“Man, I would not like to be Ito right now,” he says, tossing his phone back into his bag.

“Why, what happened to him?” Amane asks.

“Poor idiot got food poisoning last night,” Hiromasa sniggers. “When I live on a tropical island I’ll be way better with seafood. I had a hard time with the two nosy detectives so like a good brother he bought me dinner to feel better, and it looks like he’s feeling worse.”

“Are you broke again, you moron? You totally made your brother buy you dinner, don’t lie.”

“Amane, man,” Hiromasa places one hand over his heart. “Of course I did. I made him get me the good sake, too.”

“You still owe me for the last time I bought you dinner,” Amane sulks. “Stop your shitty losing streak on the cards and pay me back, yeah?”

Hiromasa makes a rude noise and Hanajima interrupts the bickering to say, “The police freaked me out, too. Like, I know where I was on Sunday and my husband and kids can confirm it, but as soon as they asked, I was like, did I get up in the middle of the night and sleepwalk and kill someone without knowing it?”

Nanase fidgets but doesn’t say anything. Kei never publicised his relationship and kept the photos to the side of his desk; since he’s only been working here a little under two years he doesn't have time to put up with intrusive questions. Amane laughs at Hanajima until they see Kei pointedly stacking reference books on the central table, and they return to work.

Kei’s just pulled out the list of objects located in the damaged drawer when his mobile rings. He doesn’t recognise the caller, but it’s unlikely someone from the media managed to track down his personal number.

“This is Tsukishima,” he answers.

“This is Oikawa,” Oikawa mimics.

Adrenaline kicks in and grabs his empty stomach in a vice. Kei stands to close his office door, ignoring the curious looks. “How can I help, detective?”

“We called in a favour from Futakuchi in forensics and fast-tracked the evidence from your storage drawer,” Oikawa says, and Kei’s knuckles turn white on the highlighter in his hand.

“And?”

“And since Tetsu-chan is too much of a coward to call you himself, I’m taking time out of my lunchbreak when I could be having phone-sex with Hajime to tell you that we found traces of Tsubasa’s blood in the damaged lock.”

“God,” Kei says intelligently, staring unseeing at his emails. To both statements, really.

“Quite. So we think the murderer was looking for something in the compactus, got spooked by the janitor, lashed out, and hurried over to try and cover the rest of his tracks by searching the drawer. He used the same blade without having wiped it properly but didn’t manage to open it, and probably ran out the same way he came in.”

“Am I allowed to know these things...?” Kei asks, biting absently at his knuckle.

Oikawa’s sigh is loud down the connection and his voice is on the sardonic side. “Who the hell knows what kind of investigation this is anymore. It’s not illegal, put it that way. Similar to what you pulled yesterday, four-eyes.”

Guilt pools in Kei’s stomach. “I apologise, detective,” he says. “If you have any further questions obviously I’ll do my best to answer them.”

“Well, aren’t you all mealy-mouthed behind that ice facade,” Oikawa marvels with false sweetness.

Asshole.

“Did you call just to let me know?” Kei asks.

“And to ask if you’d made any progress on what might have attracted our murder’s attention.”

“No, not really,” Kei admits reluctantly. “I’m working on it.”

“Hmm,” lilts Oikawa. “Well, from tomorrow we’re going to have some officers going through your files with a fine-toothed comb so it doesn’t matter.”

“What?”

“Oh yes, you might want to clear up some space in your workroom. President Kawashita just gave us the all-clear once Fujioka was reassured of our confidentiality. Good thing, too, otherwise we would have pushed for a warrant, and goodness knows how the public would have taken that.”

You bastard, Kei thinks, quite admiringly. Tetsurou once said his partner was aiming for Commissioner General: Kei believes him.

Still.

“And I’m sure the prospect of my department in disarray doesn’t appeal to you at all,” he retorts.

“Who, me? Oh, and consider this a gag order. The president will announce it tomorrow, so don’t spook the suspects.”

“Am I not included?” Kei makes himself ask.

“Perhaps you’re familiar with the expression, give a man enough rope?” Oikawa asks pleasantly. “Have a good day, Tsukishima-san. See you tomorrow.”

Kei puts his phone down on his desk and digs his knuckles into his sinus. If he hadn’t seen Oikawa’s list of commendations, if he hadn’t seen Oikawa risk his life for a child in a hostage negotiation broadcast live, if he hadn’t seen the quiet rapture in Oikawa’s face every time he looks at Iwaizumi, Kei would wonder to which side of the law Oikawa belongs.

Except, no, he wouldn’t, because he knows just how highly Tetsurou and Oikawa regard justice and the work they do; he’s just being a bitch because someone outplayed him in quiet menace.

I want to go home, he lets himself think for a moment, nerves frayed and edges run ragged. Which home? Don’t know. (Don’t lie). Just away from here.

The knock on his door brings Kei out of his fugue, and he sits up, hurriedly straightening his jacket and settling his glasses. “Come in,” he says, clicking aimlessly at some old emails.

“Hey, boss,” Hiromasa says, poking his head through. “Come and look at the pick lists, I need you to approve the choices before I make administrate changes.”

Data minutia, cure for all.

“Go ahead and update it,” Kei says an hour later, clicking through the last of the terms.

“You got it,” Hiromasa says. “No bad news earlier, I hope? You look a bit wrung out.”

“Don’t be rude,” hisses Hanajima.

“Don’t worry, that won’t hurt my feelings,” Kei drawls. “I’m confident in my dynamic personality.”

Nanase chokes on his inhale and Amane tries to turn his laugh into a cough and ends up crying into his tie. “No, no bad news,” he says over the noise. “Just my brother.”

Sorry, Akiteru.

“Glad to hear it. As long as the police haven’t been making things difficult for us,” Hiromasa says, finally uploading the changes.

“I don’t think Fujioka would like that,” Kei responds, and it’s not much of a lie. He walks to the compactus and wheels open the sixth shelf to access Bays Ten and Eleven. His team has been understandably curious, and Amane and Hiromasa seem to veer between ghoulish fascination and shock, but as far as he knows they don’t know anything about the case apart from the presence of the body. It’s unlikely Kuroo or Oikawa told them anything about the compactus, so Kei acts with his usual self-possession as he pulls the list from his pocket. Perhaps it’s time to see what’s not there, instead of what is, now that Oikawa has confirmed the murder wanted something in the drawer.

“Need a hand with anything?” Hiromasa asks, propping his shoulder against the open shelf.

For the love of god, can he just fuck off for five minutes?

Kei bites his tongue. “No, but thank you. Actually, I need you to liaise with Ryuugazaki-san about the Coptic Egyptian exhibit and see if she wants to build a portfolio that can be exported for the education tours.”

“Now?” Hiromasa glances at his watch. It’s barely four, they have plenty of time.

“Yes, now,” Kei says, putting a bite into his tone. He’s had it up to here with today, and god help whoever’s on the other side when he reaches the end of his tether.

“Alright. If there’s a loading error with the database, just call me,” Hiromasa says, grabbing his tablet on his way out the door. “One of the records might be playing up.”

“Peace and quiet at last,” mutters Hanajima, glancing over her shoulder at Kei and clearly glad she only works Monday to Wednesday.

He turns back to the folders. As he thought, most of the objects in D4.2.1 have their files here in CB10. He finds the first scarab file, flicks through it, and crosses it off the list before moving on to the second. Scarab, scarab, ushabti, ushabti, scarab, stone, faience, stone, anhydrite, faience –

11.001 is missing.

Kei breathes through the instinctive terrified jolt of a curator and tries to focus. He double-checks the records to each side and then confirms that an inscribed stone ushabti acquired in 2011 is located in D4.2.1 – it is – and that its file should be here. He walks to the compactus entry where the lists of object numbers are stuck on, and yes, Bay Ten on Row Five is supposed to house files 05.001 to 12.020.

Kei circles it on his list and moves to the next one. Don’t freak out, don’t freak out, don’t spook the suspects – is this what Tetsurou feels every time he picks holes in someone’s alibi and pieces together the evidence? Is this how he feels on the way to an arrest? Terrified and elated and smugly satisfied that your intellect has won out over theirs? Oh, he loves him, Kei loves him, wants to watch as he and Oikawa reach even higher and make the whole city dance to their tune.

None of the other artefacts have their files missing, so Kei makes sure he’s crossed off the last one and walks back out of the compactus – it would be an awful way to die, crushed in between the shelves, maybe that’s why management wants them to refresh their Health and Safety Training – into his office.

His desk phone rings before he can sit down, and he answers with bad grace, fingers trembling with the wash of adrenaline.

“Tsukishima.”

“Hey, boss, can you check something for me?”

If Kei knew Hiromasa was this hopeless he would have called in a favour from the administration department to pick the next registrar.

“What is it?”

“Ryuugazaki-san and I are looking over the module she wants to export, but some of the items aren’t in the display. Just confirm with me which ones you want?”

Patience, patience, patience. “Give me a second to find the file,” Kei says, trying to change mental gears. This is something that needs to be checked if relations between the departments are to remain cordial. “Alright, what do you have there?”

“Sir,” Nanase says a minute later, halfway into Kei’s office before he realises he’s on the phone. “Oh, sorry!”

“– but not 88.019a, that’s misnumbered and part of a different set,” Kei finishes. “Give me a moment, please.” He covers the mouthpiece and turns around. “What is it, Nanase?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt!”

“Just tell me what you need.”

“It’s nothing urgent, I just wondered if you’d signed the media permission form so Saito-san won’t have to bother us tomorrow.”

Kei stares.

“...I left a note about it on your desk at lunch?” Nanase prompts awkwardly, bobbing on his toes.

His desk looks a little like a bombsite at the moment. Kei unearths what he means, vaguely remembers Nanase saying something about it, and finds the relevant email. It looks like an attempt by the PR team to reassure the public in a five-second snippet that the Egyptology section remains interesting and undamaged. He imports his digital signature and sends it off.

“Thank you for taking care of it.”

“Of course, sir! It’s not a problem at all!” Nanase bobs again and retreats, conscientiously half-closing Kei’s door.

The gap where the file is supposed to be is burning an answering hole in Kei’s head but he tries to think rationally as he continues ticking off artefacts with Hiromasa. Kuroo and Oikawa will arrive with the cavalry tomorrow and he’ll be able to direct them with this new knowledge. Kei doesn’t need to panic. Running around like a headless chicken is Hinata’s prerogative. Don’t give anything away.

“...and that’s all, I think,” Hiromasa says. “You gonna finish on time, boss?”

“We all will,” Kei replies. “The officer guarding the door likes to cross us all off.” He puts the phone down with relief as he readies a new search in the database. 11.001, what are you hiding?

Ushabti, stone, 945-745 BCE, Thebes, inscribed with the typical spell from the Book of the Dead to turn the figure into a servant for the deceased in the afterlife. Bequeathed along with the rest of her private collection of some twenty objects to the museum by the late Emeritus Professor Castle from the nearby university. Kei frowns when he sees the documents: a very basic object report listing only material, description and inscription, a copy of the letter from the professor’s will and a receipt from an antiques dealership from 2003.

It reminds him of a long-standing desire to re-document all the patchy records, but there isn’t anything actually wrong. There are dozens of these types of badly-documented artefacts in the collection and there’s little to no chance of retroactively tracking ownership for something common like this which came out of Egypt en masse thanks to the interest of the forces barracked there in World Wars One and Two.

What part of this made someone desperate enough to attempt a midnight heist and drove them to murder upon discovery? The Castle Bequest is legitimate enough, and the professor lived here for fifty years after leaving England and died leaving everything to her older sister, who died herself a few years later. It’s not some distant heir after an inheritance.

Kei scrubs his hands through his hair hard enough to hurt. He retroactively forgives all of Tetsurou’s bad moods and his frequent need for either peace and quiet or drastic distraction during a case. Iwaizumi has a reputation for dragging Oikawa out for long hikes up impossible mountains at least once a month, often more frequently, for the same reason.

“Calm down,” he tells himself. “You don’t have to solve this tonight.”

He breathes carefully and then prints out the few documents on the database about 11.001. He’s going to have to replace the file anyway, might as well be prepared. But what if this doesn’t even have anything to do with the murder? They haven’t even been working on the Castle Bequest; what brought it to somebody’s attention?

“God, I need a drink,” Hanajima proclaims loudly as she stands, stretches, and begins gathering her things. Kei startles at his thoughts unknowingly being echoed aloud and glances automatically at the clock, where glowing red letters read 17:30.

“It’s Wednesday,” Amane points out, shrugging in his coat.

“So? It’s been a long week and I don’t have work tomorrow, unlike you poor babies,” she retorts. Amane mimes clutching at a knife in his chest, and Nanase clucks at him, jerking his head at the floor, then Kei’s office, with widened eyes. He rubs the back of his neck, muttering. They frequently seem to forget Kei has windows connecting his office to the workroom, and that he has excellent hearing.

“It’s not like Resting Bitchface cares,” shrugs Hiromasa. “Everyone, make sure you’ve logged out of the database, I need to run a diagnostic overnight.”

Nanase makes another defensive, incoherent noise and receives a rough hand in his hair for a response. “Give it a rest, Mini Mouse-chan. I’d be more worried about you. The police always go for the ones you’d least expect.”

“Oh, leave him alone,” sighs Hanajima. She needs a raise.

“No one’s any fun around here,” Hiromasa laments before raising his voice and pasting a smile on his face. Kei glances away before they suspect he’s been listening, shoving papers into his satchel. “Hey, boss, you take a break too!”

He waves a hand to show he’s heard, pulling on his coat. “Thank you, everyone, for your hard work today. I know this is a stressful time, but we need to have faith in the police and keep on doing our jobs as best we can.”

Kei actually has to make himself step out of his office. The siren song of the missing file is loud in his ears, but he only has some pieces of the puzzle and as far as his untrained mind can tell, they’re all middle bits and no defining edges. He doesn’t even have the lid to work from; he should leave it to Kuroo and Oikawa, who most likely have at least an outline.

“Let’s hope the police hurry up and do their job,” mutters Amane, winding his scarf tightly around his throat and glancing nervously back at the floor. There isn’t even a trace of blood; Kei wishes he’d calm down. “I hate walking home alone now.”

“I’ll give you a lift,” offers Hanajima. “I’m heading your way, I need go shop for dinner.”

The latest junior officer appears, nodding as they all walk past.

Kei looks back just before they climb the staircase, gripped by sudden doubt. Something is niggling at his attention, there’s something he needs to place and hasn’t...

“Sir? Is everything alright?”

He blinks and glances down at Nanase. “...Yes,” he says, turning away. “Everything’s fine.”

But on the train ride home, he can’t stop himself pricking and poking at his instincts. His headphones are blocking out the world, as usual, but where he’d devote his attention to Sia’s counter-harmony he finds himself thinking, Castle, Castle, why Castle? Ushabti, scarab, inscription. Theft, murder, police. Kuroo, Oikawa, Kawashita.

He nearly misses his stop, and Kei has to throw himself out between the closing doors, much to the conductor’s displeasure. Get a grip, he tells himself for probably the tenth time this week. Do you think that you, a mere museum curator, can solve an actual murder? Do you think that by solving this, you can somehow impress Tetsurou?

Oh, shut up, he tells himself, stomping up the stairs to Nishinoya’s apartment. God, he needs a drink too if he’s arguing with himself.

He tosses his satchel onto the table and puts the kettle on before changing out of his suit into jeans and – no, not that sweater. He grabs the one emblazoned with his own high school’s logo and stalks back to the kitchen, unpacking his bag and putting his phone on charge. The printed pages he leaves on the table, pretending that by pouring tea and listening to Tame Impala he’s keeping his distance from the mystery.

Of course Kei cracks after an unenthusiastic dinner of store-bought pork katsu half an hour later, and grabs his hieroglyph dictionary and a magnifying glass out of one of the boxes in the living room. If all else fails, do the translation yourself and work from the beginning, his college professor had once said.

The inscription is fairly standard, but some of the hieroglyphs are formed oddly, or are weathered badly –

“Son of a bitch,” Kei says fifteen minutes later, staring down at the grainy black-and-white picture attached to the condition report.

He holds the magnifying glass closer to the page to be sure, but yes, there it is. The invocation of the deceased’s name is incorrect – two syllables in the compound hieroglyph are completely misused – but it’s the _same name_ as the one inscribed on the largest of the four new ushabtis. Ankh-ef-en-Khonsu is an unusual choice, which must be why Nanase flagged it for him; maybe he ran a search and realised they already had an Ankh-ef-en-Khonsu in the collection.

But wait, he commands his heart, settling his hands palm down on the table. Don’t get ahead of yourself. Does this mean anything?

This might be the catalyst for the theft, if it was someone in the museum who saw the inscription on the new donated ushabti and made the connection between it and the other ushabti, but why go to so much trouble? What danger might the new one pose to the old one?

Finally, one of the cogs in Kei’s mind rotates far enough to catch and cascade.

He fumbles his phone out of his pocket and searches for Shobu Antiques, where Professor Castle originally purchased the ushabti, backspacing when trembling fingers hit the wrong character. The first results are irrelevant but there, on the fourth hit, is what Kei’s looking for. He’d referenced Sato Mitsuki’s article in his last university essay – which he'd aced, high off the prospect of completing his studies and the shyly unfurling happiness created by his new friendship with the patrol officer whose wicked grin and untameable hair he couldn’t get out of his head – and she had investigated several antique shops known to have fenced stolen goods.

Yes, there. Kei knew he’d seen the name somewhere. Shobu Antiques, raided in 2006 by the police after a tip-off and subsequently closed under a black cloud. He scrolls further, biting his lip, when –

... _and my source in the police department believed that in addition to fencing illegal goods, the store under Okamoto’s ownership was producing or had access to well-crafted counterfeits. Questions about a Ming Porcelain vase were raised after the shop closed by a professor who had inherited the vase from his mother. She had bought it the year before, and examination by an expert revealed it was a counterfeit of high quality, sold with a certificate of authenticity that was just as fake. 5 _

Oh holy fucking shit.

Shitshitshit.

Kei can’t quite classify the sensation sweeping through him. It’s a chill of fear and a cloud of shock and a spark of anger...but under the surface, an iceberg below the waterline, is a thrill of satisfaction at his own intellect.

He tosses his glasses on the table and presses his palms over his eyes. The stone is well-weathered. The inscription is good, the structure right, but the error in the hieroglyph isn’t caused by the eroding of time. It’s a completely incorrect glyph. It could be a mistake by the carver, since there are plenty of examples of errors sold to the unsuspecting ancient tourist, but given the rest of it, the ushabti’s presence in Shobu Antiques, its missing file, _the presence of a dead body in his workroom_...

A fake, in his collection. A fake that has driven someone to kill for it. At the very least, a suspect piece in need of carbon dating.

A fake, and five people who could have possibly come into contact with the ushabti inscription that started this.

If there is one fake in the Castle Bequest, who’s to say there isn’t another? Who’s to say another attempt won’t be made on the cabinet? If the ushabti is removed any evidence they have is gone, because Kei is absolutely sure that when he goes to check 11.001’s digital file tomorrow it won't exist.

Kei glances at the clock. It’s just gone nine. If he left now, he could catch a train without the crush of rush hour and be there in twenty minutes. Saito and Fujioka no doubt often work late, it wouldn’t be unheard of for a curator to return needing to check something.

 _Tsukki, no,_ the Tadashi in his head says.

 _Move your body too, Tsukishima! It’s no use if you just stand there overthinking things!_ the Kageyama in his memory shouts.

What is the world coming to, that he’s listening to Kageyama?

Kei stands, notates the papers, gathers them together, and hides them in a grotesque vase Nishinoya keeps on the top of the mug cupboard. He can’t quite believe he’s doing this, but the curiosity is going to eat him alive if he doesn’t and the welfare of the collection is his responsibility. He remembers how he felt, managing to outblock Shiratorizawa’s Guess Monster in the finals of their first year prefectural tournament. Tendo had had the mobility of a snake, eyes like an x-ray and muscles like steel cables, but still, patience and persistence and sheer fucking obstinacy most people wouldn’t expect from Tsukishima Too Much Effort Kei finally saw Karasuno out-dodge the block and win the championship.

His wallet, his phone, his coat, his heart in his throat, and he hurries out the door.

Kei is running up the steps from the station when he wonders if he should at least message Kuroo. He and Akiteru used to shout at the people in thrillers who opened the door to mysterious visitors late at night with no one else home, or who went outside after hearing a strange noise instead of staying behind a locked door – Kei isn’t willing to become the next victim thanks to his own pride.

_I’m back at the museum. One of the objects 11.001 is probably a fake and I think that the theft and murder was to stop that from being revealed and ruining someone’s reputation. If anything happens to me check the gruesome vase in Nishinoya’s apartment._

He pauses on a street corner, the museum up ahead. Does he sign it with his name? Tetsurou probably deleted his number, or Kenma did it for him, but how many people does Tetsurou know at the museum anyway?

“For fuck’s sake,” Kei mutters, breath misting in front of him and ears aching in the cold. I’m on the tail of a murderer and _this_ is what I’m worried about?

He signs it Tsukishima, sends it, silences the phone, and strides forward.

He has the physical key to open the side door, and when the alarm begins its countdown Kei disarms it with his code before rearming it behind him. He pauses for a moment in the corridor, trying to steady his breathing.

A museum at night is an eerily liminal space, full of shadows that don’t seem to fit the space and spaces that have too many shadows. Time seems an arbitrary concept in a place that houses evidence of human history over a span of five thousand years, and sound doesn’t seem to work right under the echoing vaulted ceilings and between the austere glass cases.

Kei wishes suddenly he kept up his basketball routine. In the good old days he could hipcheck someone hard enough to have them flat on their back without even getting sinbinned. No one comes to investigate the door, though, and in this side corridor the only ambient noise is his own breathing, his own heartbeat. He could be all alone in the world, and the only light is the glow of power in the alarm console and the sickly green emergency exit sign above his head.

Adrenaline kicks his heart into a higher gear.

ID in hand in case he’s tackled by an overzealous security guard, Kei makes his way as quickly and quietly as he can to the staircase leading to the Egyptology section, relying on memory rather than the flashlight app. There’s no sign of a guard in the lobby booth even though the low interior light is on, and foreboding prickles up Kei’s spine. He’s probably on his patrol, and the cameras are all operational; there’s nothing to worry about. Don't turn this into a Thing.

Still, the foreboding feeling grows when he reaches the head of the staircase. In deference to the guard still posted outside Egyptology, the lights in the corridor below have been left on their lowest settings. Should he approach carefully, or should he make noise and hope the officer in front of the door doesn’t arrest him on sight? Kei pauses again, heart in his mouth and sweat cold on the back of his neck.

He can’t hear anything.

Instinct wins over reason, and he tiptoes down the stairs with as little noise as possible, keeping close to the wall.

No shout splits the air, no demands to halt and identify himself, to get on the ground with his hands over his head. When Kei reaches the bottom of the steps, he sees why: there’s no one standing guard outside his workroom.

Foreboding metamorphoses into fear.

Where is he? The officer didn’t say anything this afternoon about the possibility of cutting the watch short. Has something…happened to him already?

Calm down, Kei tells himself. Maybe he’s just gone to the bathroom. In the meantime, hurry, and don’t think about how awkward it’s going to be to explain this when the guard returns.

He passes the door to the workroom and taps his keycard against the storage room’s reader. It’s loud in the silence, sending his heart skittering, but again, no one comes running. Kei pulls the door open and slips inside, turning on the lights and blinking fiercely at the sudden glare. Nothing is out of place, and no one jumps out at him.

Kei takes a moment to breathe deeply, counting the seconds.

The storage room is a strange L-shape thanks to a lab used primarily by geology infringing on their space. Waist-high cabinets with five drawers set in each line the left side wall and larger cabinets with single doors holding the bigger objects are built along the right. The rest of their reference books, catalogues and journals sit on top, most spines creased and some patched with tape. In the foot of the L, out of sight of the door, is a table with lamps and a magnifying apparatus. The cabinets continue in the perpendicular section and there’s a projector screen on the back wall.

Kei steps forward once it feels less likely his heart is going to burst out of his chest and heads to the back of the room directly opposite the door. D4.2.1’s new lock is gleaming in the overhead lights and Kei pulls out his keys. On the other hand...he really hadn’t thought this far ahead. What is he going to do with the ushabti? He can’t just put it in his pocket and walk out with it, even for safe-keeping. Holy shit, he’d be fired on the spot and it would set a horrendous precedent.

The safe in his office, he decides, bending down to open the drawer. 11.001 is still there, nestled in its foam tray, light catching on its detailed headdress. The axe and hook in the figure’s crossed arms are so accurately incised Kei foregoes gloves as he picks it up, trailing his fingers along the surface. The ushabti is as long as his hand, cool to the touch. It’s not like he has the training to tell with only tactile guidance if this is a fake, though, so he locks the drawer and moves over to the work table and pulls out his phone. Photographic evidence never hurt anybody, and with several angles saved Kei pulls the magnifying lamp over and squints down at the hieroglyphs carved into the ushabti’s abdomen.

He’s right, he’s sure he is: the hieroglyph in the third row is definitely incorrect, and if necessary Kei will call in every favour he has with the finance department to get this shipped off to be analysed –

The hairs on the back of his neck stand up and his mind thrills in horror a moment too late: Kei feels the knife against his throat before he can even shift his weight, and he freezes.

“Don’t move,” Hiromasa hisses, fisting a hand in Kei’s hair and wrenching his head back. Kei can’t quite silence the grunt of pain the action causes, and the knife digs in warningly against his thrumming, thrumming pulse. Why did he think checking the files late at night was a good idea?

“You weren’t supposed to be here,” Hiromasa despairs, echoing Kei’s thoughts. “Why the fuck did you come back, you stupid fucker? Everything was going fine, I just needed the shabti, and now you’ve blundered in and ruined it!”

Kei would like to object to several parts of that, namely the blundering in part, since he was here first; the things going well part, because there’s a dead body as proof Hiromasa fucked up the first time; and any of this mess being anything like what he had planned for a Wednesday night. He doesn’t, though, because contrary to popular opinion, Kei has enough self-preservation instincts not to antagonise someone who’s holding a knife to his throat.

“Easy,” Kei manages, head still wretched back and hands held placatingly up to his sides.

“Don’t tell me to take it easy,” Hiromasa spits, confirming Kageyama’s long-held belief that Tsukishima Kei cannot say one word without annoying somebody, although Kei’s fairly sure Kageyama never thought it would be like this. “Now I have to deal with you too, after the whole fucking mess this turned–”

Kei’s phone vibrates with a call, jarring and sudden in the quiet of the storage room. Both of them jump, and Kei feels blood begin trickling down his neck. It takes everything he has not to swallow and jostle the blade further, adrenaline warring with bone-chilling fear and both coaxing his heart faster, faster, blood warm and wet in the collar of his shirt.

The display is just a number, not one listed in his contact list, but that’s only because he deleted the profile himself sixty-three days ago.

Kei takes a shuddering breath, hope suddenly burning bright in his heart – no, even more than that, more than the possibility of aid from a police detective. Just thinking his name feels like it always had when they were together, sheer joy fizzing through him at the mere thought of the person Kei loves so much.

He doesn’t move to pick up the phone from where it’s vibrating on the table beside the ushabti, no matter how much every sinew in him yearns for it, but Hiromasa tightens his hand in Kei’s hair anyway.

“Leave it,” he demands.

It rings out, and then a second later begins again. Kuroo must have got his text, is either worried or angry, has maybe even figured out the whole thing and has realised something is wrong...

“It’s my boyfriend,” Kei says as calmly as he can. “He’ll keep ringing until I pick up, and if I don’t answer this late he’ll be worried. He might come looking for me.”

It’s halfway through the second attempt. God, what if Tetsurou does realise something’s wrong and rushes in here? Kei will be a hostage, a game piece, an impediment to Detective Inspector Kuroo and the reason his actions are compromised. “Let me answer, and buy time. You can listen, if you want. Just let me talk to him so he doesn’t worry and do something stupid.”

Hiromasa is breathing unsteadily behind Kei, hand in his hair shaking though the knife remains steady. It rings out again, and then immediately starts ringing a third time. If he doesn’t answer after sending that text, Tetsurou will definitely start panicking. Oikawa might not be able to talk him down, and if they both burst in here it’ll be a stalemate until someone makes a mistake.

“I can make it stop,” Kei says again, calm and monotone like he’s talking to Yagi about the numbers of signboards their department will need.

Ten seconds. Nobody knew Tsubasa, so it might not have been hard to lash out – Oikawa’s eerie lilting voice echoes in his head, _a blade here, a twist there_ – but Kei is banking everything on the chance that having known Kei for months, having gone out to eat and drink with the team, Hiromasa will find it more difficult to actually commit murder. He might not like Kei, but five hours ago they were still colleagues. Everything is cold and still in Kei’s head, each moment turned momentous as his heart beats like it’s his last second, second, second.

“I can make it go away, Hiromasa. Everything will be fine.”

“Do it!” Hiro shoves him forward, the knife still within striking distance from his throat.

Kei lurches for the phone, swipes accept and hits speaker.

“Sorry I missed your call, darling,” he says immediately, before Tetsurou can say something to set Hiromasa off. “I was working with my AirPods in.”

There’s a beat of silence on the other end as Hiromasa presses the knife back to Kei’s throat. God, Kei hopes Tetsurou still remembers their signals. In the years they’d been together, Tetsurou’s career had taken off; they’d taken a leaf out of Oikawa’s book halfway through and decided on key phrases to use in situations where someone decided to use a detective’s personal life against them. Not that Iwaizumi had needed backup.

Even if Tetsurou doesn’t remember the signals, surely he still knows Kei, surely, even after their ragged and rough breakup, he still knows Kei would rather cut his ears off than use AirPods...doesn’t he?

“It’s alright, sweetheart,” Tetsurou replies just before the silence becomes noticeable. “I was just checking in to see how late you’d be working.”

“Still awhile,” Kei says, trying not to let his knees collapse in crippling grateful relief. “Things are pretty messy down here.” Isn’t that an understatement, but it should do the trick. And still, despite all that, despite the fear and the recrimination and the two months of misery, _darling_ on his tongue is the sweetest thing he’s ever tasted.

Hiromasa has positioned himself to the side where he can see both Kei and the phone on the table, shifting his sweaty grip on the knife.

“Did the boss leave you to do it alone again?”

Hiro presses threateningly without reopening the cut and Kei glares at him from the corner of his eye.

“How many times,” he says, sharp. “He’s just a colleague, why do you keep asking if he’s staying late with me!”

Hiromasa sneers, like he’s privy to the supposed rocks in their relationship, and Kei thinks, _Lap up the drama while you can, asshole._

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Tetsurou snaps back, and there’s a faint _tch_ afterwards, a scoff not out of place in this kind of argument but Kei recognises it as Oikawa’s way of letting him know Tetsurou isn’t alone either. Thank god – please god – there has to be a way through this. If Oikawa’s there, it’s official, and if Tetsurou is calling so late, three times, it’s not just to yell at him for going back to the scene of a crime. They must know what’s going on, surely, or they do now and are on their way to the museum; he just has to give them as much to work with as possible.

“No, I know, sorry,” Kei says, softening his tone, propping his hands flat on the table as his mind works faster than it’s done in weeks of grey, grey, grey. “I’m just a little bit off. I think Yamamoto gave me his cold.”

Even after the breakup Kei still went to visit Yamamoto’s grave, the first of Tetsurou’s squad to lose his life in the line of duty. On their scale of code words, it’s exactly what it sounds like – lethal danger.

“Fuck,” Tetsurou rasps involuntarily, sounding far more serious than he’s supposed to.

“It’ll be alright,” Kei says just as Hiromasa starts gesturing for him to hurry it up, sliding the knife back and forth across Kei’s skin.

“Maybe you should get some cough medication.”

Even though Kei wishes he had time to think through his answers, offer as much information as he could, too many pauses would be suspicious, especially if Hiromasa hears any background sounds through the connection. Weapons being readied, the dispatch radio, sirens.

Speaking of – cough medication. A cough can release an explosive charge of air up to eighty kilometres an hour: Tetsurou thought it would be the height of cunning to choose that to represent a gun.

“No,” Kei says, keeping an eye on his assailant and starting to speak just a little faster. “I feel fine, I just need to finish up with the storage. Don’t wait up for me, okay? I have to go, work is waiting on me.”

“Okay, I’ll count the seconds until I see you later,” Tetsurou says. He’d sound normal to anyone who didn’t know him well. “I – I love you, Kei.”

His lungs seize, his heart clenches; being shot would probably have less of an impact. “I love you too,” Kei tells Tetsurou, voice catching, as Hiromasa jabs end call.

“You’re taking it up the ass from some useless pansy like him?” Hiromasa leers, shoving Kei’s phone off the table onto the floor. It better not be broken, Kei swears to god, or he’s going to cut this asshole. “I wouldn’t date a sulky ice bitch like you, can’t believe you get laid. Or are you actually cheating on him?”

“Either kill me or shut up,” Kei snaps before common sense snatches back the reins. It doesn’t matter anyway; _count the seconds_ means they’re close, they must be close.

“Maybe I will,” Hiromasa retorts, getting a disgusting, murderous hand back in Kei’s hair as leverage to tip his head back again, blood beginning to trickle from the reopened wound.

“Then what?” Kei asks hoarsely, resisting the urge to grab the lamp off the desk and use it as a cudgel. “Add another body to your court case? If I’m not back tomorrow my boyfriend will call the police and they’ll use the swipe data to see it was you. Don’t make it worse –”

“Don’t fucking talk like you know me!” The knife digs in deeper, pain beginning sharp and stinging. The only saving grace is the angle: Hiromasa is shorter than Kei, and he’s standing slightly to the side with the blade resting against the ridges of Kei’s windpipe. It won’t be a clean slash if he does try and it’ll probably miss his jugular; he could staunch the bleeding as long as Tetsurou hurries, hurry, where is he, thoughts flickering like lightning through Kei’s head.

“Knock me out, take the ushabti and run. You don’t have time to kill me and wash up, my DNA will be everywhere. The curator’s body is going to have more of an impact that a janitor’s. Do you _want_ the police to catch you?”

“You’ll just call them the moment I leave!”

“Not if you gag me and run, get out of the city, out of the country. You’re clever enough to do that, right? You said something about a tropical island today, isn’t that your getaway? You’ve managed to delete the records by now, nothing can tie you to the crime. No one knows it was you, unless you kill me down here and they use the security cameras.” It goes against the grain to compliment the so-called intelligence of a murdering thief, but needs must where the devil drives. He could probably twist away to lessen the damage of the knife but if he’s wrong by even the smallest amount he’ll bleed out down here without ever seeing Tetsurou again and telling him Kei never stopped loving him, that he forgives him and that he’s sorry, too, for his part in their stupid, stupid fight.

Hiromasa shifts on his feet, breathing fast. Kei keeps his voice low and steady and sure. “Hit me and go, Hiromasa. You don’t have much time. You can’t afford for this to go wrong. You can still get away.”

His breath catches, the blade shifts –

If Hiromasa was going to listen, they’ll never know: the click of card reader at the door is loud in the fraught silence and is the last match this conflagration needs. Hiromasa gasps and whips his head toward the door, knife digging into to Kei’s throat; Kei brings his arm up to shove the knife away and kicks back, shouting, “Tetsurou, he’s here, hurry!”

“Fucking son of bitch,” snarls Hiromasa, recovering his balance and lunging after Kei, who’s darted around the work table with a hand to his bleeding neck.

“Kei!” Tetsurou yells, the door slamming open. “Kei?”

“Here!” Kei shouts again, and it’s only for a split second, an instinctive reaction to the panic in Tetsurou’s voice, but he glances away all the same from Hiromasa’s eyes ablaze with desperation and he pays for it – not at first, not for the first second of shock where the impact just hits and knocks the breath out of his body –

But then –

Oh, then. Just as Tetsurou comes skidding around the corner, looking like he’s been hit by lightning with a slightly more put-together Oikawa on his heels, Kei feels it and his knees buckle.

“ _Kei!_ Tooru, get the guy!”

Burning agony courses through him as he curls up instinctively on his side, breath shaking out of him. This whole thing is a pain, why the fuck did his night have to end with him being _stabbed_?

Vaguely Kei notices Oikawa putting his shoulder into a tackle and hears the wail as Hiromasa goes down, but nothing matters but the voice shouting his name and the knife still embedded in his side, slow crimson beginning to bloom across grey.

“Kei, look at me, don’t move the knife! Fuck, everything’s going to be fine,” and knees thud down beside him.

“T-Tetsu,” he manages, dragging his eyes away from the mind-bending sight of a knife sticking out of his side, like isn’t that something that happens to other people? It’s meant to happen to the people in Tetsurou’s folders at the station and not in his normal everyday life, but when he looks towards Tetsurou, beautiful, frantic Tetsurou, he feels warm familiar hands pulling his own bloodied ones away to see the wound and sees mobile caught between ear and shoulder.

“This is Inspector Kuroo, I need an ambulance at the City Museum immediately! Victim has been stabbed, knife still in place. Suspect apprehended by Inspector Oikawa, backup already on the way.” He lets the phone fall, eyes never leaving Kei’s face. “Kei, fuck, I’m so sorry, I should have gotten here sooner –”

“Don’t,” Kei rasps through his shallow breathing, teeth gritted against both the pain and the urge to breathe faster, panic, wrench the knife from his body, and writhe in the unbearable agony blazing through his body like fire. In the background he hears Oikawa shouting arrest rights over Hiromasa’s cursing, _may be given in evidence against you_ like a documentary, if only his side wasn’t burning. “You’re – here, you came, fuck this hurts, Tetsu –”

“I know, moonshine, I know, but we have to make sure the knife isn’t jostled so the paramedics can stabilise it. The ambulance is on its way and you’re going to be fine, you hear me? You’ll be fine, Kei, everything is going to be alright.”

“Listen to the good detective, four-eyes,” Oikawa says from nearby, and if Kei could look away from frantic hazel he’d glare at the old nickname. He’s been stabbed, and the smug asshole still can’t help getting under his skin. You can really tell where Kageyama picked up some of his more irritating traits, Kei thinks wildly. “Everything is going to be alright. I’ll take him up to the lobby and direct the paramedics down to you. It won’t be long, so keep calm and take slow breathes.”

Handcuffed and helpless, Hiromasa’s curses and rants echo through the room as Oikawa shoves him towards the door. Kei doesn’t see them go, can hardly track the time passing through the haze of pain as Tetsurou strips off his jacket and folds it carefully in shaking hands to wrap it around the entry and exit wounds. “It’s not a fatal wound, I promise, you’ll be fine as soon as the paramedics get here.”

“At least the b-blood’s internal,” Kei hisses through his teeth, half a grin and half a grimace. “Where it’s s’pposed to be.”

Tetsurou’s laugh sounds like he’s the one who’s been stabbed. “Salt is only good for wounds in small doses,” he retorts weakly. “You’ll need stitches and bedrest but you’re going to be fine, sweetheart, you just need to stay awake, do you hear me?”

“Tetsu,” Kei rasps, unable to say anything else, but he gets it, always has, and Tetsurou leans down to press his lips fiercely to Kei’s, then to his cheek, his forehead, crouching close as Kei whispers, “The – the ushabti, it’s f-fake, he – he must’ve known – gambling debts – I can’t th-think –”

“Stay awake, Kei, promise me,” Tetsurou whispers desperately.

“Trying,” Kei mutters, blinking rapidly as he attempts to focus on a blurry, hazy Tetsurou, no more than a shock of wild black hair and a pale, pale face. His body is very cold but his side is burning; black spots are beginning to appear in his vision and his arms don’t seem to want to work anymore. Luckily his hands are caught under Tetsurou’s and Tetsurou at least is still awake, since his beloved, dearly-missed voice is speaking.

Kei should probably try and understand what he’s saying; it seems important because now Tetsurou’s voice is pitching up, louder and more frantic, but Kei hasn’t the energy to focus anymore, he’s so tired and cold and it hurts so much, but Tetsurou is here and that means it must be safe to sleep once again by his side.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW YOU ARE ALL AMAZING :D I hope you enjoy the next parts, we've had our angst and pining, and now doctors and dentists recommend copious amounts of fluff xxx (Also, I'm definitely not a doctor, so if anything is wrong in the hospital scenes/wound care, forgive me!)

Kei wakes to the smell of antiseptic.

Oh good, he isn’t dead – then one wrong twitch sets his abdomen on fire, and _fuck_ , can he be dead now, please?

“Maybe next time don’t get yourself stabbed, idiot,” Akiteru chides from the side of his bed, leaning forward to rest a hand on Kei’s shoulder. Kei grunts, eyes scrunched shut as he tries to find an optimum breathing depth. “You needed surgery but there weren’t any complications. You’ve been resting since then, this is the second time you’ve woken up but they said you probably won’t remember the first, and it’s now,” Akiteru pauses, presumably to look at his watch, “noon on Thursday, the day after you were stabbed. A nurse is on the way, they told me to call when you woke up.”

Kei hums again in understanding, but doesn’t open his eyes until a nurse bustles in, checking various pieces of equipment. Akiteru places his glasses gently on Kei’s nose, and he has never loved his brother more.

“Good afternoon, Tsukishima-san. How are you feeling?”

“Peachy,” Kei manages.

“I’m sure,” the nurse smiles sympathetically. “Can you tell me your full name and date of birth?”

“Tsukishima Kei, twenty-seventh of September 1993.”

“Excellent. And do you remember how you came to be here?”

“I was stabbed. At the museum. Asshole. Did they arrest him?”

The nurse glances at Akiteru, who nods. “He’s been charged. You’ll have to give your statement when you recover, and you’ll have to talk about whether you want to press additional charges.”

The nurse runs through a few more things, adjusts his IV and then bustles away with another smile after reassuring Kei that the doctor will be by to discuss his injury and rehabilitation in more depth but that overall he was lucky. “You should heal up nicely, and be back to normal soon if you don’t overexert yourself!”

“Thank you,” Akiteru says, and turns back to Kei as the nurse pulls the curtain closed. At least he’s in a bed at the end by the window, if he can’t have his own room. “Well, that’s one way to spice up a week.”

“Mmm,” Kei agrees, lifting a hand to his throat. The thin cut has already scabbed over and by the feel of it doesn’t even need gauze, so he cautiously examines his bandaged side instead. The IV drip in his elbow suggests he must be well-medicated, a hypothesis confirmed when he gathers enough drowsy hand-eye coordination to brush gently at the bandages and feels only a twinge. Out of morbid curiosity, he pokes a little harder – and regrets it.

His brother notices his wince and pulls his hands away, tutting.

“Don’t poke at it! What are you, five?”

“And a half,” Kei mutters but before Akiteru can retort a doctor sweeps back the curtain and steps up to the bed, grabbing Kei’s chart.

“Tsukishima?”

“Yes,” Kei says, and offers his date of birth again just in case. The doctor nods briskly and introduces himself as Yusei.

“So, penetrative injury to the abdominal wall and small intestine due to a knife. As stab wounds go, yours was almost textbook. Only one organ lacerated, the knife missed your colon, and we drained the blood quick enough there should be a low risk of infection. If you had to get stabbed anywhere, low and just over your hip isn’t a bad choice. That being said, I hope you don’t have any more plans to be stabbed in the future.”

“Once was enough for me,” Kei hurries to assure Doctor Yusei.

“Good to hear. Anyway, the only downside to it was length of the blade – you have two wounds to take care of. Because of that, we’ll need to keep you in here until Saturday at the earliest so we can also monitor you for any signs of infection. If you feel lightheaded or feverish, or notice any bleeding in your bandages, please inform a nurse immediately. Try not to move too much or breathe too deeply, and after we take out the catheter tomorrow you’ll need to ask for assistance to use the bathroom. Keep the bandages dry, and of course we’ll go over home care and medication once you’re closer to being discharged. I’d also recommend not being alone for the first forty-eight hours and resting as much as possible.”

“We’ll sort something out,” Akiteru says.

The doctor nods again and checks the IV. “Like I said, you’ll heal up fine if you take care and don’t push yourself. Just because it was an easy fix doesn’t mean recovery is going to be as straightforward.” With this dire warning, he continues on his rounds.

“Maybe he heard you calling me a child,” Kei mutters, trying to get comfortable leaning to his right without either straining the wound in his left side or tugging at the IV site. At least he’s lucid; he still remembers with great hilarity how loopy Hinata was after reacting badly to the pain medication he received in third year for dislocating his shoulder.

“Speaking of, I had to call mum and dad,” Akiteru says, handing him a glass of water and waiting till he’s finished it. “They’ll be here tomorrow. I was...surprised to get the hospital’s call.”

“What, you didn’t think someone would eventually try and stab me?” Kei asks flatly and the worried lines around Akiteru’s mouth fade as he finally laughs.

“No; actually I’m surprised it took this long.”

“Ha ha.”

“Yes, I’m hilarious. No, I meant, I hadn’t realised you’d changed me back to being your emergency contact.”

Kei stills.

“Not that I mind, of course!” Akiteru hurries to reassure whatever look is on his face. “I’m glad you’re alright; gave me quite a scare. I was just surprised – but I shouldn’t have been. I know how efficient you are.”

That‘s true. When they’d fought, broken up – was it really a breakup when they were both just too angry and stubborn to apologise, and then the same work that had been the cause of the fight dragged them apart for long enough that the horrible, hurt silence made it impossible for Kei to do anything but collect his things from their apartment while Tetsurou was at work and pretend not to care that Tetsurou couldn’t even call after that when he hadn’t called either? Well, either way, they had created a divide they had not tried to bridge, so after Tadashi dragged Kei out of a weekend of grief-stricken hibernation and wheedled him into taking a shower and changing clothes and eating some food, Kei had gone back to work and vindictively, systematically, furiously tried to untangle himself from Kuroo any way he could.

He’d only been part successful, anyway. They hadn’t yet had a joint bank account, but there were so many small things that kept cropping up, twisting the knife deeper – oh. Ha. Apt analogy. God, being stabbed _hurts_.

“When I got here,” Akiteru continues, “Kuroo met me in reception – with your blood on his sleeves, way to reassure me about your condition – and said he had to go back to the station to charge the bastard who knifed you. Then later he came back and then the friend with the tufty hair dragged him out. He asked me to contact him when you woke up.”

Akiteru’s phone is in his hand, a question he hasn’t asked aloud, and Kei doesn’t answer either but his silence is enough for his brother, who hasn’t always known what he meant but knows him enough to understand what he doesn’t say.

Kei falls back asleep to the tap of Akiteru’s fingers on his phone screen and wakes to the sight of Tetsurou sitting there instead, magnificently backlit by the setting sun in an annoyingly accurate representation of the hole in Kei’s universe without him.

“Mmnneehhh,” is unfortunately the first thing he says, throwing a hand up to shield his eyes from the light.

“Sorry,” Tetsurou murmurs, standing hastily to close the blinds. “Better?”

“Yeah,” Kei says hoarsely and Tetsurou pours him some water without being asked, handing him his glasses once Kei has finished remedying his dry throat.

Slipping them back on, Kei takes full advantage of being able to see and just – gazes, god that’s what he’s doing, doe-eyed mooning at this man. Kei hopes that this is a result of the pain medication, but is unfortunately well aware it’s just Tetsurou’s usual effect on him.

He looks exhausted, drawn and worried and dull. That ridiculous crest of hair is drooping, the rich ebony lank and lustreless, and his button-down shirt is wrinkled, sleeves pushed messily up to his elbows. And yet, Kuroo Tetsurou is still the most stunning thing Tsukishima Kei has ever seen, and oh fuck, he’s tearing up.

“Kei,” Tetsurou rasps, sounding like it’s been wrenched out of him as he lunges for Kei’s hand. “Are you alright, does it hurt? What can I –?”

“Nothing, it’s fine, I’m fine,” Kei says thickly, tearing his eyes away and staring determinedly up at the plain ceiling. “I just...” he squeezes Tetsurou’s hand, and his world falls back into alignment when Tetsurou returns it. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Tetsurou breathes, extending his other hand to brush his fingertips against the red line on Kei’s throat. “Oh, _fuck_ , Kei...” he ducks his head, pressing his forehead to the back of Kei’s hand, held tightly now between both his own, calloused and familiar and so dear. “Kei...”

“I’m sorry,” Kei says, and then the dam breaks. “About – about everything. I didn’t mean half of what I said, and I shouldn’t have said the rest that I did mean because you didn’t deserve it, Tetsurou I am so sorry –”

A kiss pressed fiercely to his knuckles silences him for a moment. “I’m just so glad you’re alive,” Tetsurou says, voice wobbling.

“Do not cry, Tetsurou, I swear to god I will kick you out if you turn on the waterworks,” Kei warns him, voice equally thick. It’s a secret a select few are under orders to take to the grave – Tsukishima Kei turns into an empathetic crier whenever he’s tired.

Tetsurou huffs a wet laugh to the back of Kei’s hand and looks up at the ceiling too, blinking furiously. “I mean it, though. I came around the corner just as you collapsed, and the knife sticking out of you...I have never been so terrified, Kei. That took a few years of my life, no matter what it’s done to yours.”

“Well, it didn’t end it, so there’s that, I suppose.”

“Oh, you suppose, do you, skinny jeans?”

They manage a moment of smirking at each other before Tetsurou’s expression turns earnest. “I’m sorry, too, Kei; you don’t know how much.”

“This wasn’t your fault,” Kei begins with as much energy as he can, well aware Tetsurou is capable of blaming himself for Hiromasa’s decisions until the stars burn out, but Tetsurou shakes his head, pressing another kiss to Kei’s hand.

“Well, I’ll spend the next year wishing I’d been there sooner, but I also mean about everything. I’m sorry, Kei. I just...we were both angry and so stubborn and I was so sure me and my deductive reasoning were in the right that I didn’t want to risk my stupid pride by apologising and risked losing you, instead. In the end, it was all pointless anyway – Superintendent Yagami decided to take the transfer but swapped his team with Amajiki, who loaned Tooru and me right back to Homicide after all. All that run-around, and for what? Coming home to an empty apartment and the flyer for your latest exhibition.”

“I love you,” Kei blurts out helplessly, desperate to erase the haunted look in Tetsurou’s eyes. “I –” he swallows, “Tetsu, I –” and he shuts his eyes, too much going through his head but needing to speak, unsure of how to. That stupid exhibition, and Kawashita changing his mind four times an hour, Uzumaki gone on leave and leaving him to pull the rest of it together while setbacks piled on top of delays...Kei has never been good at speaking clearly about his emotions at the best of times, since on a good day he mostly pretends he lives off coffee and sarcasm alone, but now, when it’s so important he not let Tetsurou slip through his fingers again, he can’t even find the words.

“I love you, too,” Tetsurou says quietly, fingers slotting perfectly in the gaps between Kei’s own. “I know, Kei. I love you too. Never stopped.”

Kei breathes carefully, not too keen on either aggravating his wound or bursting into tears, and clutches at his lover’s hand. He’ll need the words eventually, but for now, Tetsurou understands him.

“We can both say sorry on the count of three, if you’d like,” Tetsurou offers, sounding like he’s wearing that feline grin.

“Or what, you’ll be disappointed in both of us?” Kei deadpans, opening one eye to glare balefully at him.

“I’ll only be disappointed if we don’t fix this,” Tetsurou says, slipping back into seriousness. “We can, Kei. I want to, if you do.”

“Go and ask a nurse to check you over,” Kei commands, heart swelling like sunlight in his chest. “What part of clinging to your hand like a damsel in distress didn’t clear it up for you?”

“Well,” Tetsurou says, clearly biting down on a grin, “you were in a great deal of pain, what with having a ten-inch blade sticking out of you. You probably would have clung to anyone, even Kageyama.”

“Get out,” Kei tells him flatly. “Tell Akiteru to ban you from my room.”

“You’re not in a room, you’re in a curtained cubicle.”

“Tell Akiteru to ban you from my curtained cubicle, then.”

“Fair enough. You couldn’t have been that confused, after all,” and Kei eyes that shit-eating grin with mounting suspicion as Tetsurou says oh-so-very-suavely, “You’ve had ten inches inside of you before –”

“TETSUROU,” Kei whisper-shouts incredulously, and then hisses as his reflexive urge to jerk upright pulls burningly at his stitches.

“Shit, Kei, I’m –” Tetsurou lurches forwards, one hand still gripping Kei’s and the other fluttering uselessly over his abdomen where Kei has a fist bunched in his hospital gown, breathing carefully. “I’m so sorry, should I call someone –”

“Just a police officer,” Kei manages, “that was so terrible it should be illegal.”

“Honey, handcuff me,” Tetsurou says, relief in his face as he falls into his old response. “If being good is bad, I’ll get a life sentence.”

“Urgh,” Kei says, pretending like he isn’t smiling despite himself as his eyes begin to prickle with overexertion.

“Speaking of,” Tetsurou says, settling back into his chair and stroking soothing circles into the back of Kei’s hand with his thumb, “do you want to hear about the case?”

Kei shakes his head, eyes falling shut no matter how many times he tries to keep them open. “Tomorrow,” he mumbles, bringing his free hand up to rub under his glasses. Tetsurou gently lifts them off his face and sets them on the side table.

“Okay,” he agrees softly, “tomorrow. We can talk tomorrow, about everything.”

“You’ll be here?”

“The riot squad couldn’t keep me away. Akiteru will be as well. He said he’ll come see you before he picks up your parents from the station.”

“God.”

Tetsurou laughs. “It won’t be so bad.”

“Says you,” Kei grumbles, shuffling down into his thin pillow. The hospital bed is slightly raised, no doubt to lessen the pressure on his stab wound, and it makes for an unfamiliar way to sleep. With Tetsurou’s hand in his, though, and his voice in his ear, anywhere could be home.

“Yeah, says me. Who wants to bet whether or not they’ll tear me to shreds?”

“Won’t let them.”

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Tetsurou croons, dropping another kiss on his hand. His phone buzzes and he fishes it out, saying, “Bokuto,” when Kei makes an enquiring noise. “Tooru finally reached his limit of what he’ll put up with from me, so he kicked me out of the office and Akaashi ended up dragging me back to sleep on their couch last night. Bo’s waiting in the lobby.”

“Good,” Kei mumbles, “you shouldn’t be alone.”

Tetsurou kisses his hand again. “They’d love to see you tomorrow, too, if you’re feeling up to it.”

“Mmm,” agrees Kei, and then twitches his fingers reprovingly in Tetsurou’s hold. “There’s nothing wrong with my mouth,” he mumbles, cotton-stuffed mind hoping he’s audible.

“You’re right,” Tetsurou agrees just as softly. “Now that’s an oversight I definitely should be arrested for.”

The chair creaks, and a shadow falls over Kei’s face. Warm breath hushes over his lips before Tetsurou’s mouth closes gently over his and at long last it feels like he’s finally come home.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Tetsurou whispers when he pulls back, thumb brushing Kei’s temple. “Sleep well. I love you, Kei.”

“‘Nd you,” Kei thinks he murmurs, and feels one more kiss left lovingly at the corner of his lips before he falls asleep.

He rouses several times during the night thanks to the presence of nurses bustling quietly back and forth along the wards but succeeds in going back to sleep each time, and when he does wake properly, it’s to a nurse adjusting his IV and lowering his pain medication now he’s more than a day out from his surgery. She rids him of the catheter with swift competent hands, and then supports most of his weight as he helps him sit up so she can unwind the bandages for the first time.

“Ah, it’s looking fine,” she says brightly. Kei takes her word for it: the wound he can see at the front is slathered in brown-staining iodine and is red and puffy beneath surgical gauze with neat black stitches lined up in rows along the incision. The exit wound in his lower back is presumably the same, and a purple bruise is already spreading like spilled ink under his skin. “The stitches will have to come out in about ten days, but with some care they might not scar deeply at all. At worst, they’ll be little white lines and you won’t have to worry about them. It’s a good thing your attacker didn’t twist the knife once it was in, otherwise there would have been much more damage done.”

She’s been nothing but cheerful and has borne his sharp temper at his own body’s inability to take his weight with nothing but a patient smile and some reassuring words; Kei bites his tongue and doesn’t say anything. The wounds look raw and unpleasant to him, burdened as he is with the type of pale skin that shows any type of imperfection, but maybe...Tetsurou has several scars and Kei loves each and every one. Surely he won’t mind any on Kei’s skin?

Assuming they do fix what’s broken between them. He hopes so, oh, Kei hopes so, fingers curling into his bedding until his knuckles are white. He can finally see through the fog and he’s going to fight this time. If he has to swallow his pride, so be it. It’s not like he doesn’t want to – often, it’s just that he doesn’t know how.

“Oh, I’m sorry, is it hurting you?”

The nurse’s voice breaks Kei out of his reverie and he reassures her that the new dressing isn’t too tight, relaxing his fingers in the blankets.

“I heard from Doctor Yusei that we would be releasing you soon, so make sure to eat a good breakfast!” Another nurse brings around trays of miso soup, and Kei unenthusiastically accepts his portion: thanks to the sutures in his small intestine he’ll be off solids for the next few days at least.

Akiteru sneaks him in some watered-down coffee and laughs unsympathetically at Kei’s snotty recounting of breakfast when he visits later that morning. “Do you remember that time I was sick with bronchitis and you ate chicken katsu in front of me?”

“I was _seven_ ,” Kei defends. “Can you please let that go?”

“No way, we’ll be in our seventies and I’ll still bring it up at family reunions.”

“God, you’re such a baby. Why am I the younger sibling?”

“Keep frowning like that and you’ll age faster than me. No one will be able to tell.” Kei scoffs and Akiteru grins, bobbing the foot he’s got crossed over his knee. “Mum and dad’s train gets in at ten, by the way. I’ll bring them by just after. I also texted Tadashi; he said he’ll come by during visiting hours this afternoon.”

“I might be with the police this morning for my statement,” Kei warns him.

Akiteru gives him a smugly knowing look. “Mm, I bet you will be. A certain detective looked like he was walking on air when he left last night.”

“ _Tch_ ,” Kei answers, staring out of the window and willing the heat in his cheeks to recede.

“No, I’m serious, Kei,” Akiteru adds, lowering his voice and resting a hand on Kei’s elbow. “He looked so happy, and you do too. Are you going to try and patch it up?”

As much as he wants to fob his brother off with a glib answer, a smile mutinies and even biting his lip doesn’t do anything to prevent the trembling joy from peeking through.

“Oh, thank god!” Akiteru slumps dramatically back in his chair, beaming. “I’m so glad, Kei!”

“Can’t you see me dancing a tango in joy?”

“You’re transcendent,” Akiteru agrees solemnly. “Oh, by the way, in the interests of full disclosure and doing my brotherly duty...”

Kei may still be coming out of the cotton-candy world of pain medication but a particularly destructive period in middle school involving Akiteru’s wild promises of excellence, the school’s basketball team, and his brother’s actual absence from that team makes him wary of Akiteru’s prevarication. “What.”

“Tadashi said that Yachi-guchi was FaceTiming Hinata when he got my text –”

“No.”

“– so he might have let slip what happened –”

“ _No_.”

“– and you might have more visitors than you anticipated this afternoon.”

“There has to be some Geneva convention that prevents this,” Kei growls, reaching for his phone and feeling that instant immobilising fear when it isn’t within easy reach. “Where the hell is my phone?”

Akiteru says, “I don’t think the Geneva Conventions had friendship in mind, so don’t be such a grump. As for your phone, last I heard Kuroo had it.”

Now Kei remembers Hiromasa swiping it aside after he’d hung up on Tetsurou. “It had better not be cracked, I swear, or I’ll sue for more than just being stabbed.”

“Ah, youth,” Akiteru teases, taking full advantage of Kei being bedridden and not being able to retaliate. “So attached to their devices.”

“You are literally on Instagram,” Kei hisses at him.

“Hashtag relatable.” Tetsurou swans into the cubicle in all his suited glory, an equally debonair Oikawa on his heels. What black sorcery have they harnessed not to have horrendous dark circles under their eyes, and where can Kei get some. “Hashtag livingmybestlife, hashtag nofilter.”

Akiteru is in stitches – not literally, Kei still has the upper hand there. He ignores them all to the best of his ability, which isn’t much when Tetsurou circles around the bed.

“Hello, gorgeous,” he murmurs, taking a seat on the edge of Kei’s bed and putting Kei’s phone onto his bedside table.

“You have five minutes,” Oikawa sighs, and closes the curtain behind himself and Akiteru.

“I’ll have you know that this washed-out hospital look is completely organic and done without the aid of either a filter or makeup,” Kei informs Tetsurou, “and believe me when I say this is not my best life.”

“I’d be worried if it was,” Tetsurou agrees, and bends down to kiss Kei good morning. Only now does it seem like the day will go right, and he threads a hand into Tetsurou’s rejuvenated hair to keep him close when he pulls back to breathe.

“Mm –” kiss, “– Kei, I came to –” kiss, “– tell you it was –” kiss, kiss, “– time for your statement...” kiss, kiss, kiss.

“I was stabbed,” kiss, “and Detective Kuroo saved me,” kiss, “the end.” Kiss, kiss, kiss. “Mm, you taste like proper coffee.”

“Tooru bought me some,” Tetsurou sighs, opening his mouth and shivering when Kei licks along the soft line of his lip. “I think he – ohhfuck – he’s feeling bad about throwing me out the office –”

Kei surfaces long enough to say, “Make sure you bleed him dry,” before Tetsurou is retaliating, stroking the tip of his tongue along the roof of Kei’s mouth so perfectly Kei’s grip nearly stretches the line of Tetsurou’s beautiful suit.

Tetsurou finally wrenches himself away, breathing heavily, hair even more dishevelled. “I, ah,” he clears his throat and rakes his fingers through his hair, adjusting his tie. “I don’t think that will quite convince the jury. How are you feeling?”

Kei shrugs. At least with the meds in his blood, he doesn’t seem to have to worry about telling his body to calm down. “They’re dialling back my pain medication but as far as I can tell, if I don’t move too suddenly everything seems fine. It gives me a few days’ break from Kawashita and the press, at least.”

“Brave acting curator takes on murderer single-handedly,” Tetsurou agrees, running his fingers through Kei’s hair. “The news is already running that. Now in stable condition at nearby hospital, demands pay rise. And promotion.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice. Apparently I have to deal with Dumb and Dumber this afternoon, too, after my parents.”

“Maybe I’ll tell Bokuto to drop by tomorrow instead,” Tetsurou says, smiling. “You’re probably going to be exhausted after all the excitement.”

“No,” Kei says quickly, catching Tetsurou’s free hand and linking their fingers. “I’d like to see them. Akaashi’s the best cure for idiocy, and after a double shot of Hinata and Kageyama I think I’ll need an inoculation.”

Tetsurou laughs and leans in for another kiss. “I’ll pass on the message.”

“Time’s up,” cautions Oikawa as he steps back into the cubicle. “Tetsu-chan, out. Go make nice with your in-laws. And for the love of god, do something about that hair.”

“Ruthless,” Tetsurou sighs. “Tooru will take your statement, and then your parents will probably be here. I’ll see you after lunch?”

Kei nods, narrowing his eyes warningly as Tetsurou blows smoochy kisses at him while letting the curtain slip closed so slowly they could be at a burlesque.

“ _Out_ ,” Oikawa commands again, shaking his finger at Tetsurou. “Honestly, the pair of you,” he sighs, turning back to face Kei and folding himself elegantly into what should be an uncomfortable visitor chair and of course looks like an armchair beneath him.

“What did I do?” Kei retorts.

“Other than get stabbed?” Oikawa points out sweetly. “Send my partner on such a roller coaster he couldn’t tell left from right or up from down. I do hope you’ve finished yanking him around?”

Kei stares at him, blank-faced. He’s never been afraid of Oikawa, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t well aware of the viper behind the pretty scales. Fortunately, Oikawa is – mostly – on the side of angels, and Kei’s poker face is a little worse for wear after the morphine. “Good, I’m glad,” Oikawa says, beaming. “Now, let’s get to this, shall we?”

He crosses one knee over the other, notebook out again like it had been only a few days ago, and Kei takes him through Wednesday. He tries not to use too many esoteric terms as he talks through searching for the files of the objects in the damaged drawer and realising one was missing, and then finding evidence that the ushabti with its incorrect name had been bought from a shop suspected of fencing illegal goods and passing counterfeits off as genuine antiques.

“The presence of the new ushabti with the correct invocation would throw doubt on the old ushabti’s inscription if it was brought to light,” he says, after showing Oikawa the article still loaded on his phone. “We would have informed the police, and probably tried to track other purchases from that dealer. With that kind of black mark, or even an implication of forgery, no one would want to associate with the objects. There’s usually some sort of case open at any given time about counterfeit objects; Hiromasa was probably worried he’d be linked to it somehow. And he had gambling debts, though I don’t know if that has anything to do with it.”

Recalling everything Hiromasa said is a little harder, but he feels like the physical evidence should speak for itself.

“Well done, Tsukishima,” Oikawa says when he’s finished writing everything down. “But perhaps next time leave the investigation to the police? We were already on our way to the museum, there was no need for you to be there well past closing hours with a murderer on the loose.”

“It was a rather spur-of-the-moment decision,” Kei informs him. “So how did you know it was him?”

Oikawa smiles his sword-slash grin. “Apart from the fact a neighbour reported hearing someone come home in the early hours of Monday morning, we knew about his shady history with less than authentic goods after our friend Hiromasa let slip a few pertinent details about who he worked with in college. He wanted to be sure we understood how interesting, intelligent and well-connected he was when we went to interview him. You might be interested to hear he was after your job too, Tsukishima.”

Kei curls his lip. “I knew he didn’t like me, but wanting my job? He can’t seriously have thought he’d have a shot. He has no experience with exhibitions, just registration. He preferred to talk up his own achievements than actually do the work.”

“He certainly liked to spin stories,” Oikawa says. “A certain type of criminal likes to talk, you see. He’d managed to take the file before Tsubasa found him, and he confessed to lashing out after Tsubasa refused to accept his reasons for being there. He didn’t mean to do it, but it meant a failure on his part so when we were there he talked around the subject as much as he could. He thought he could lead us astray, throw us all sorts of red herrings, and because he was so sure he was cleverer than us, he told us things he shouldn’t. He didn’t explicitly mention working in an antiques shop, but checking on his associates led us eventually to his ‘old friend’ Okamoto Ryohei.”

Staring at him, Kei repeats, “Okamoto Ryohei? The man who actually owned Shobu Antiques?”

Oikawa grins. “The very same. We’ll have to do some digging, of course, but it’s probable Hiromasa actually worked with Okamoto around the time that ushabti was sold.”

“Fuck,” is all Kei can say, absently adjusting his glasses as he stares at Oikawa’s smug face. “Really? I knew he must have some connection to it after he went to such lengths to cover his tracks once it was put at risk, but…”

“Indeed. You can see how we might have been a little suspicious upon discovering that little titbit, even though we had to eliminate down some other leads too. Apologies to your little mouse.”

“Ah, I wondered how he knew you suspected Nanase after the missing keycard,” Kei says, snapping his fingers as some of the pieces dancing at the edge of his subconscious finally click into place. “He wasn’t even there on Tuesday, so how could he have known Nanase had been interviewed again? He must have stolen the card himself to divert suspicion.”

“See what I mean? Unfortunately for him, we’re better. And he didn’t know we’d added a security camera to the loading door.”

“Well, how was I supposed to know that part?” Kei retorts. “And trust me, I have no intention of being on the wrong end of a knife again.”

“That’s what they all say,” Oikawa tuts. “Anyway, we’ll have your statement typed up and brought over to you to sign, and we’ll need you to drop by the precinct once you’ve been discharged to discuss your role in the prosecution going forwards.”

Kei nods. “Cross my heart and hope to die, detective.”

“That would rather negate everybody’s hard work, now wouldn’t it,” Oikawa says, standing and buttoning his suit jacket.

“By the way,” Kei says, before he can leave, “what happened to the police officer stationed outside the workroom?”

Oikawa rolls his eyes. “Heard a noise down the corridor, went to investigate, woke up bound and gagged in a closet. Backup found him when they searched the premises.”

“Really?” Kei asks, doing a poor job at quashing his smirk. “Well, at least he didn’t have his throat slit.”

“Quite,” Oikawa agrees. “In any case, Shibayama is one of our younger recruits. Either he’ll quit, or this will count as his hazing and all that’s left is a steep learning curve. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I should get back to the station. My best wishes for your recovery, Tsukishima,” he adds, waving languidly over his shoulder as he turns to find the edge of the curtain. “Feel free to take your time and heal up properly.”

“Why?” Kei asks, unimpressed.

Oikawa looks back at him, smirk coiled slyly in the corner of his mouth. “With you and Tetsu-chan out combining what I’m sure will be very touching make-up sex with hopefully not too strenuous thank-god-I’m-alive sex, Hajime and I can christen my new desk _thoroughly_.”

Tetsurou reappears a moment later, looking bemusedly over his shoulder as Oikawa’s peals of laughter fade into the distance. “What on earth did you say to Tooru?”

Kei turns to him, horrified. “Did you know he intends to debauch his new desk with Iwaizumi as soon as you’re not there?”

Tetsurou stares blankly at him and then winces. “Well, I mean, he did with the old one too, so...”

“God, I used his desk once,” Kei groans, trying to scrub the memory from his mind. Granted, this is Oikawa, so the likelihood of him messing with your head is always a solid eighty percent, but then again, Iwaizumi and Oikawa have been together for nearly ten years, married for half of that, and they still can’t keep their hands off each other. He wouldn’t put anything past them.

“And on that traumatising note, your parents are here!”

Kei barely has time to glare before his mother hurries into the ward and around the curtain.

“Kei, honey!”

“Mum,” he says, bracing himself, but Akiteru must have warned her and the hug she wraps him in is tight but gentle.

“Oh, honey, are you alright? We were so worried when we got the call!”

His father steps in too, and Tetsurou retreats quietly, closing the curtain around the four of them.

“How are you, Kei?” His father puts a hand on his shoulder, squeezing tightly.

“I’m fine,” he says, kissing his mother’s cheek when she withdraws, blinking at him with watery eyes. “It wasn’t a serious injury.”

“You were stabbed, Kei!”

He meets Akiteru’s gaze and his brother grins sympathetically: their mother is never going to relinquish this proof that the big city is too dangerous.

It takes half-an-hour, but eventually his parents are placated – Kei does have to put his foot down about moving back in with them, and when he brings up his job, his mother says, _where they let people be murdered!_ which honestly is a fair point – and the visit turns less into seeing a son in a hospital bed and more into a reunion they haven’t managed since Christmas last year.

“...and your aunt Inko put on so much weight, I could hardly keep my mouth shut.”

“Don’t be so judgemental, dad,” Akiteru says, laughing.

“She was always the nicest to us,” Kei agrees.

“Well, she may have bribed my children to like her better with chocolate and candy, but her as for own...goodness.” His mother shakes her head. “Not to brag, but at least my sons have full-time work and live out of home.”

Kei dislikes his cousin Tamaki intensely, but that goes to war with his desire to point out that the likelihood of his generation owning their own home in a suburb, let alone a metropolitan city, anywhere under thirty is extremely low.

“Tamaki-kun at least has a girlfriend,” his father points out from behind his newspaper, like he isn’t fully aware he’s pouring fuel on a fire.

“Dad,” Akiteru whines immediately, slumping back in his chair. He broke up with his latest long-term girlfriend several months ago when she moved overseas; since he hit thirty-five last year their mother is...perturbed, to say the least, especially since her elder son is her only chance at grandchildren.

“Well, as for that relationship,” his mother says dangerously, “I’d say that Tamaki-kun could do better, but it’s none of my business.”

Kei glances out of the window at the clear blue sky, sun warm on the surrounding buildings and throwing glimmering reflections off skyscraper glass into the hospital. He and Tetsurou went on a picnic several months ago in weather just like this. Hopefully they’ll be able to do it again, maybe in spring when the cherry trees are in bloom.

“Kei?” His mother’s voice is soft and smiling; he glances over at his parents to see them watching him.

“I’m sorry,” he says, “were you talking to me?”

“It’s alright,” she replies, taking his hand and squeezing it. “I was just saying I hoped I’d be able to see you happy again soon, but I think my wish has been granted.”

He goes red, can feel the heat sweep up his cheeks, and his father laughs.

“If you’re happy, Kei,” he says, “then we are too.”

“Are you sure, though?” His mother adds, clutching at him. “You did break up, was there a reason? Are you sure reconciling will make you happy?”

“I’m sure,” he says, smiling at them and returning her squeeze. “It was a stupid fight.”

His mother kisses his cheek. “As long as you’re sure. Bring Kuroo-kun along the next time you come down for a holiday, alright? I’m sure a big city detective would like some peace and quiet once in a while.”

By now Kei is wishing for some peace and quiet of his own, and welcomes the arrival of a nurse to check his dressing with relief. His father assures him they’ll stay to see him settled safely in Akiteru’s spare room before heading home on Sunday afternoon, and his mother is already clucking at Akiteru about the food in his fridge. His brother bears up well, just pulling a face at Kei as they say goodbye, and Kei resolves to buy him either his weight in chocolate or a visit to the hot springs, whichever comes out cheaper.

Lunch is broth and more broth, and at least he has his phone again because if he didn’t Kei would be so bored he’d feign cardiac arrest just for something to do. Tetsurou is tied up doing paperwork and Kei fends off half his department and most of the upper management in a heated hour of email, but other than that, he’s left to his own devices. The older woman in her bed on the far side of the ward has a Sudoku book nearly as thick as her arm, and Kei is desperately envious.

When afternoon visiting hours commence, though, he almost wishes for mind-bending boredom again.

“TSUKKI!”

“Tadashi, this is a hospital,” he hisses. “Keep it down!”

“Sorry, Tsukki!” His best friend says, hurrying across the ward and seizing his arm. “How are you?”

“TSUKISHIMA!”

“What did I just say, Hinata!”

“He’s fine,” Daichi jokes, rounding the corner – in full uniform – with Tanaka on his heels. Armageddon is nigh.

“Daichi-san, the nurses are going to think I’m on some sort of watch list,” Kei despairs, shaking hands with them all and trying not to show how touched he is that they came to visit on a Friday afternoon when they all have better things to do.

“Well yeah!” Hinata chirps, staring at the hospital bed and Kei’s IV drip with wide eyes. “You got stabbed!”

“Not my fault,” Kei snaps. “I’m fine, Tadashi, enough with the face!”

“Don’t mind, you salty bastard,” Tanaka jibes cheerfully, leaning against the wall. “We’ve all wanted to stab you at some point!”

“Tanaka!”

“Come on, Daichi-san, it’s true!”

“Kageyama says sorry, but he’s on duty,” Hinata says, offering his phone as if to prove Kageyama has legitimate reasons to be anywhere but Kei’s convalescent bedside.

“I’m don’t know if I’ll survive the disappointment,” he says. Tadashi sniggers, dropping into the chair beside him and patting his shoulder – carefully, like he’s afraid to put too much pressure anywhere on Kei’s body.

Kei flicks him in the forehead.

“Suga and Asahi send their apologies and well-wishes too,” Daichi says, setting the fruit basket down on the bedside.

“Oh, thank you,” Kei says, surprised and pleased at the sight.

“We all chipped in for this, even Noya,” Tanaka holds out his phone to show Kei the fully caps locked message he’d received when the news of Kei’s injury came through. The one on Kei’s own phone isn’t too different, but Tanaka’s has all the rude words. “Kiyoko wanted to come but she had to deal with customers at the store.”

“So did Hitoka,” adds Tadashi, “but she couldn’t get time off.”

“Thank you,” Kei says again, looking down at his lap and hoping the flash on his glasses covers his eyes.

Daichi smiles. “Suga has his class of hellions and Asahi has several commissions due today. They’d like to see you when you’re feeling better, though, so we’ll have to organise a Karasuno reunion!”

“YES!” Hinata leaps skywards, nearly hitting the top of the curtain rail, and three voices hiss at him to calm down.

It doesn’t really get better from there, but as Kei recounts an abridged and PG-rated version of finding the murderer and stalling for time before actually being stabbed – Tadashi goes green and Daichi grey – he finds himself battling a smile. With the happiness back to overflowing inside him, the noise of his friends doesn’t resound achingly anymore in the empty space. He has enough energy to contribute, too, telling Hinata off and bickering with Tanaka and mollifying Daichi. Tadashi watches it all with a knowing gleam in his eye and smiles, smiles, smiles.

“When are you being released?” Daichi asks, when the noise has quietened down a little and the nurses aren’t looking at them like they’re a decibel from being thrown out anymore.

“Tomorrow, as far as I know,” Kei answers, eating his last illicit strawberry with slow care. “The stitches will come out in ten days, barring complications. Oh, I meant to ask, Tanaka; do you mind checking in on Nishinoya’s apartment and making sure nothing’s gone bad in the fridge? I don’t think I left anything in there, but I’d rather be sure.”

“‘Course,” Tanaka says, tossing his banana peel in the bin.

“I’ll be in my brother’s spare room for the next few days,” he continues. “It’s not like I can’t walk, but my family was here this morning and I think if I didn’t agree my mother would force me into a wheelchair.”

“I thought you said Suga was teaching all day?” Hinata asks Daichi, who nearly inhales his piece of apple.

“My actual biological mother, idiot!” Kei says over Tanaka’s roars of laughter.

“Uh, idiot, I knew that!” Hinata scowls, but the twinkle in his eye says everyone’s laughter was his plan all along. After all these years Kei knows he shouldn’t underestimate him, but every now and then, like when Hinata does something especially stupid, he almost forgets.

“Well,” Daichi says, recovering, “if it’s the doctor’s orders.”

“I know,” he sighs. “Grin and bear it.”

“You’ve been grinning an awful lot, Tsukki,” Tadashi notes innocently. “Even with the police roaming in and out.”

 _Traitor_. “Shut up, Tadashi,” Kei says automatically, narrowing his eyes at him as Daichi hums contemplatively. Fortunately, the implication flies over Tanaka and Hinata’s heads.

“Tsukishima’s probably just smug he worked it out before the detectives did!”

“If I were a cop, I’d definitely suspect you,” Tanaka assures him, and Kei thanks him, touched.

The radio in Daichi’s vest starts crackling and they all fall silent, but he just grins and stands. “That’s my lunch break over. I’m sorry, Tsukishima, I have to get back.”

“You didn’t have to inconvenience yourself,” Kei says, looking up at him.

“Not at all,” Daichi smiles, clapping a hand to his shoulder.

“Thank you.”

“Oh, and say hi to Kuroo for me, would you?” Daichi asks quietly while the others are distracted. “I’m glad. See you at the reunion!”

Before Kei has time to fight down the blush, he grins and waves, strolling out of the room with a jaunty whistle trailing along behind him.

“What’s that look for?” Tanaka asks, poking a finger into Kei’s cheek.

One down, two to go. Kei turns on Tanaka with a tranquil smile and says, “Oh, nothing, really. I was just wondering if the next time we would all be in a hospital together would be to celebrate Kiyoko-san’s safe delivery.”

Tanaka goes beet red and starry-eyed. Kei is not a nice person, and wishes he had a camera.

“That – you – when – work! I gotta – yeah, get back to work! Feel better, you bastard! See you, Hinata!”

Tanaka marches out, chest so puffed it almost seems impossible his feet are touching the ground.

“What’s wrong with him?” asks Hinata, helping himself to another apple.

“Tsukki, don’t break anyone,” sighs Tadashi.

“It’s their fault for being so easily provoked,” Kei defends, eyeing Hinata.

Either Tadashi wants to spare Hinata or he’s noticed the circles under Kei’s eyes; before Kei can launch his next campaign Tadashi is making noises about the time and reminding Hinata he has training on the other side of the city. Hinata jumps about gathering his things and Kei smiles at Tadashi, rolling his eyes just because.

“You’re really alright?” Tadashi asks, and Kei nods.

“I suppose you’d better come for dinner at Akiteru’s on Sunday to make sure,” he says.

“You could have come back to our spare room, you know?”

“I didn’t want to inconvenience you again,” Kei shakes his head. “And it’s biologically mandated that Akiteru put up with me.”

Tadashi laughs. “You’re not a bother, but as long as you’re settled it’s fine. I’d better get back to work. I’ll see you Sunday; please don’t get into any more trouble between now and then!”

“Man, have you met Tsukishima?” Hinata suddenly chirps, cackling madly as he waltzes out of the ward. “See you later, jerkface!”

“You’re so microscopic no one can see you anyway!” Kei retorts. It’s not one of his best, but it’s the principle of the thing. Tadashi just sighs at him, trying to hide a grin, and waves as he makes his way out too.

“Goodness,” says the lady in the other bed. “I didn’t know it was typhoon season.”

Kei winces. “I’m so sorry about them,” he begins, but she laughs, waving him off.

“Don’t mind me, I’m getting out of here tonight so you can have party if you want. Just watch out for Nurse Naoi, she’s a real battleship.” She turns over and brings out her Sudoku again.

Kei grins and reaches for his phone again to reassure Nanase for the third time he’s fine and doesn’t need anything, and then commences yet another round of battle emails with the legal department.

“What’s got you frowning so much?” Tetsurou asks an hour later, poking a finger into the furrow on Kei’s forehead.

“Tetsurou,” he says, looking up as his heart leaps. Ah, he’s back to this now, is he?

“What?” Tetsurou says again, his own smile slipping into something sweeter at whatever glow is in Kei’s eyes – it’s come to this, he knows he’s glowing, _god_.

“Nothing,” he says, tipping his chin up for a kiss. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Didn’t go to Nekoma for nothing, skinny jeans,” Tetsurou grins. “Nine lives and feline feet.”

“Toe beans,” Kei deadpans, pinching the pads of Tetsurou’s fingers and grinning when it sends Tetsurou into a wild paroxysm of laughter.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Bokuto bounds in. “I’d know that noise anywhere!”

“And I’d know that hair,” Kei retorts, biting down on his grin as Akaashi waves silently at them over Bokuto’s shoulder.

“And I’d know that skinny-ass attitude! Tsukki, you’re not dead!” Bokuto stands by the bed with his hands on his hips, surveying the scene before him. “Not for lack of trying, though. Dude, why’d ya have to go and get stabbed?”

“It really wasn’t my intention,” Kei defends, rolling his eyes. “Why does everybody ask that?”

“It’s ‘cause you’re a b–” Bokuto begins cheerfully before Akaashi’s sharp elbow is delivered pointedly and punctually into Bokuto’s side.

“Please, Koutarou,” Akaashi says as his partner keels over into Tetsurou’s lap, whining. “Hello, Tsukishima. It’s good to see you’re alright.”

“Hello, Akaashi,” says Kei, nodding back, slightly nervous despite himself. He knew Bokuto might still resent him for hurting Tetsurou but he isn’t entirely sure how to take the faint chill in Akaashi’s always-even tone. “Thank you for coming, I hope it wasn’t inconvenient.”

“Nah,” says Bokuto, straightening up to sit on Tetsurou’s lap and, judging by the grimace, cutting off some circulation thanks to his formidable workout routine. “We’re happy to help out a friend. It’s good to have you back, you spindly-legged jerk!”

Breath rushes out of Kei like relief has turned tangible and socked him in the stomach; he shakes Bokuto’s hand tightly when he offers it and smiles at Bokuto’s beam.

“Bro,” says Tetsurou, forgoing his uncomfortable squirming for the moment and wrapping his arms tightly around Bokuto’s waist. “ _Brokuto_.”

“Bro,” Bokuto affirms comfortingly, hooking an arm around Tetsurou’s neck and patting his hair. “Kubro.”

That just leaves Akaashi, and Kei glances over at him as Akaashi takes the spare seat Tanaka found somewhere and folds his hands neatly in his lap.

His look is distinct from Oikawa’s, who usually gives off the active impression of drilling right through your head into your subconscious where all your secrets are buried. Akaashi, on the other hand, simply stares until you start spilling your guts of your own accord, guilt manifesting under that passive stare until secrets can’t withstand the quiet expectation in that gaze and out themselves to avoid disappointing him.

Just because Kei knows this, though, doesn’t mean he’s immune.

“Why didn’t you call?” Akaashi asks calmly, limpid ocean gaze resting on Kei’s face.

“Uh,” Kei says.

“Did you think we didn’t _care_?”

“No, I –”

“Did you think we wouldn’t _help_?”

“But I –”

“Woah,” Bokuto says, throwing himself out of Tetsurou’s lap and bounding over to wrap his arms around Akaashi’s shoulders from behind, pressing a kiss to his temple. “Don’t terrorise the string bean, he’s already in hospital.”

“Exactly,” Akaashi says, no change in the tone of his voice. “There’s swift medical attention at the ready.”

Tetsurou breaks into his hyena cackle again, linking his fingers easily with Kei’s. “Flawless reasoning, Akaashi.”

“You should have seen the reverse park he pulled off with only one hand!” Bokuto boasts, leaning forward in his excitement and draping himself over Akaashi. Akaashi simply takes his weight with the impassive expression of long experience. 

“Where was the other hand?” Kei asks innocently, keeping his face as blank as Akaashi’s.

Bokuto blinks, train of thought unexpectedly derailed, and Akaashi pats his hands, as composed as ever. “On the gearstick, Tsukishima. Where else would it be?”

“Oh, is that how you change his mind so quickly?” Kei responds, raising one thin brow. Tetsurou is laughing so hard he’s gone silent, wheezing on the edge of the bed and flapping one hand uselessly at his streaming eyes.

“Hey!” Bokuto blurts out, going scarlet as he finally catches their drift. “I can change my mind without Keiji touching my –”

Akaashi’s hand is over Bokuto’s mouth so quickly Kei didn’t see it move, and unless his eyes deceive him, there’s a faint crest of rose high on Akaashi’s cheekbones. “I know you can, but you don’t need to tell the whole world.”

Unoffended, Bokuto just cups Akaashi’s face in his broad palms and beams at him upside down. “But sugar, you are my world.”

Akaashi definitely goes pink, and as Kei groans involuntarily, a grin finally breaking through, Tetsurou surrenders to gravity and slides off the chair to hiccup on the floor, laughing in breathless fits and starts until Bokuto strides around the bed and hauls him upright.

“Dude, gross! Some bugs in hospitals don’t respond to antibiotics anymore, so don’t lie on the floor!”

“Obviously you’ll be fine,” Akaashi says to Kei as the two begin bickering about god knows what. “Just finish whatever course of medication the doctor prescribes and keep the wound clean.”

“I will,” Kei says, meeting his eyes steadily. “Thank you for coming. I hope this hasn’t affected your work week.”

“Not at all,” replies Akaashi calmly, and it’s probably true. He runs his publishing department with an iron fist clad in a velvet glove. “How are you?”

“Better,” Kei says, gaze drifting to where Tetsurou has pulled out his phone to prove a point, Bokuto craning his neck to see the screen. “Much better.”

“Good,” says Akaashi, depthless eyes all-knowing. “I’m glad.”

Nothing else really needs to be said, and a few minutes later Akaashi is chivvying Bokuto out of the ward after wringing a not-at-all reluctant promise out of Kei and Tetsurou to come round for some of Bokuto’s signature curry after the stitches are removed.

“I’ve missed your curry,” Kei confesses, thinking of the bland broth waiting for him in the evening.

“For you, a double portion, Tsukki-dude!”

“No fair!” Tetsurou protests. “He never eats as much as me anyway!”

“He got stabbed like a badass,” Bokuto points out. “He gets double.”

“My favourite person,” Kei says seriously, and Tetsurou pouts.

“Maybe I should –”

Kei’s hand is tight around Tetsurou’s wrist before he can finish wishing for injury. He lives with the constant background fear of Tetsurou being hurt on duty; no way is the man provoking fate now, when one of them was already used as a pin cushion.

Tetsurou glances at him and his face softens. “Well, maybe I can forgive you, just this once.”

“Magnanimous as always,” Akaashi says, desert-dry and with a final wave, they disappear down the corridor.

Kei sighs, sinking back into bed. “My appointment book is full up, no admittance after business hours.”

Tetsurou takes his usual seat, one knee crossed comfortably over the other as he pulls a typed page from inside his jacket. “Kenma says hi electronically and that he’ll buy us a take-away buffet when things have died down. Check and sign your statement, will you? Then that’s done. As for the rest, I’ll turn away the mass of adoring fans crowding the waiting room,” he says, grinning as Kei glowers.

“Don’t even joke about that,” he says, skimming his statement and signing it with a flourish. “I live in fear of my colleagues showing up, let alone upper management.”

“Don’t worry, you can have the nurses turn them away. In fact, I’ll do it instead; you’re looking much too tired. And you’ve lost weight.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be a charmer?” Kei asks, quirking an eyebrow at him as Tetsurou folds up the statement and returns it to his pocket.

Tetsurou smirks, but his fingers come up to brush the purple circles still lurking under Kei’s eyes. Kei pushes them gently away and asks the wall to the right of Tetsurou’s head, “What, do you want to hear about what great sleep I got without you hogging the covers?”

“I’m sure it was as great as mine without you, you lying pillow-thief.”

“Oh good,” Kei says, looking at him again, “you’re just as terrible a person as I am.”

Tetsurou laughs. “I’m not denying it, but what’s the context?”

Kei chews on his lip, eyes focusing on the buttons on Tetsurou’s shirt as something dark and cold begins to unfurl its cloying tendrils from where it’s been repeatedly shoved down to the base of his spine. “There are a lot of people who wouldn’t have too difficult a time tolerating you, I guess. You should probably find one of them. Someone who wasn’t hoping you were as miserable as they were, someone who didn’t want you to be hurting, someone who didn’t strip their apartment of all their things and hope you regretted it as much as they did. Someone not so afraid to try. Someone – nice.”

Silence falls for a moment, then two, then three. Kei fiddles with his fingers and tries to ignore his stomach slowly being eaten away by his own acid. Why did he have to say that? Probably because he isn’t nice, and the only thing worse than losing Tetsurou is Tetsurou losing him.

“What on earth,” Tetsurou says, in that low drawling rasp that appears only occasionally, the one that, if voices were people, would be the one down a dark alley with a grin like a knife and a knife in their hand, “makes you think I’m nice?”

Kei fixes his gaze on his own hand as it’s lifted out of his lap and brought to a wicked, smirking mouth; watches as teeth are set ever-so-gently over his knuckles and the jaw closes until indents of pressure threaten to turn presence into pain. Above their hands gleam Tetsurou’s eyes, that rare jewel-bright gleam that shows itself in the Witching Hour, the one that appears in the gloaming and reminds Kei that beautiful and kind and brilliant Kuroo Tetsurou is also a man who hunts killers, who looks at death and destruction and grieves but looks anyway and comes back again and again to dip his toe in the deepest abyss of human nature, laughing as it gazes back at him. Kei is not nice, but neither is Tetsurou, and his darkness is different but it’s there just the same.

“Good,” Kei says again, and if he can’t lean he’ll pull, so he does, and pulls Tetsurou closer with fingers and thumb pinching his chin until Kei can kiss that thin smirking mouth, his own tongue just as sharp as Tetsurou’s teeth and their edges fitting together just as well as their fingers do between each other’s.

“Is that sorted?” Tetsurou asks, and he’d sound normal if Kei didn’t know him so well. “Because I wanted you to hurt just as much as I was hurting, and now that we’ve established we were both satisfyingly miserable, I’d rather we went back to being blissfully happy together.”

“Well, I suppose that sounds like something I could fit into my busy schedule,” Kei answers, thorny vines retreating back into their pit and flowers blooming brightly in their wake.

“Sweetheart,” Tetsurou says, smiling, the reflection in his eyes fading back into the dark side of the moon until he needs it again, “it took us around seventy-two hours after seeing each other again to reconcile –”

“And a stabbing,” Kei puts in, dropping their linked fingers to Tetsurou’s thigh, one of his highly-ranked favourites of all his favourite parts of Kuroo Tetsurou.

“– seventy-two hours and a stabbing,” Tetsurou amends, “to reconcile, which tells me that we were never meant to be apart.”

Colour flames Kei’s cheeks and he has to bite down on his lower lip to prevent a thoroughly uncharacteristic beaming smile from sweeping across his face. “The evidence does seem to suggest such a finding,” he says instead, glancing under his lashes at his lover. “I suppose you’re not wrong.”

“One of my favourite hobbies is not being wrong,” Tetsurou agrees, and Kei pinches Tetsurou’s wrist where he’s been trailing his fingertips.

“Excuse me, a hobby?” He repeats incredulously. “Darling, I hate to break it to you, but your literal profession is built on your desire to be right.”

“Be right and do right,” Tetsurou marvels. “I should get that on a t-shirt, Tooru and I would totally kill it!”

“Hmm, again, not exactly your profession,” Kei sign-songs, smiling widely enough now he can’t even be bothered trying to hide it. Tetsurou laughs and leans down to kiss the apple of Kei’s cheek, his nose brushing Kei’s eyelashes.

“Since compiling the evidence is actually my profession,” he continues, “and the evidence points to us being meant to be together, what do you say?”

“I say, in the somewhat-overplayed words of Beyoncé Knowles Carter, if you like it you should put a ring on it.” Kei doesn’t know how he gets through that with a straight face, but he does, looking up into Tetsurou’s face and seeing the answering delight sweep across his features.

“I will, moonshine,” he says softly. “Don’t worry, I will.”

“But not now!” Kei adds hastily, suddenly terrified Tetsurou might propose with him lying wan and rumpled in a hospital bed.

Tetsurou bursts out laughing. “God, but the look on your face would be priceless!”

“Yeah, and then you’d be in the bed next to mine with a concussion,” Kei retorts, trying not to strain his stitches.

“And a Band-Aid for my broken heart,” Tetsurou snickers, wiping his eyes. “One of the Hello!Kitty ones, or a Pusheen. Cats or nothing.”

“Why would you need one, cats notwithstanding?” Kei asks, nonchalant as he can. “Not like I’d ever say no.”

“Not even at a baseball game on the kiss-camera?” Tetsurou asks, eyes soft, grin wicked, and hand gentle as he brushes the hair off Kei’s forehead.

Kei shudders instinctively at the mere mention of one of the recurring subjects of his nightmares.

“Are you _trying_ to provoke me,” he sighs up at Tetsurou, pouting mostly because Tetsurou is absolutely weak in the face of the expression.

The PoutTM reigns supreme once more: Tetsurou caves, laughing. “I’m sorry,” he says. “What can I do to make it up to you?”

Kei winds a hand through his hair. He knows his damn grin is turning besotted, but he can’t help it: there is no force in the universe strong enough to stop it. “Kiss me again, and then go buy me some strawberry shortcake. Hospital food sucks.”

Tetsurou obeys the first part with alacrity and vigour, so much so that only an accidental whimper on Kei’s part thanks to his stitches protesting the deep breath he tries to take after Tetsurou steals the air from his lungs stops it turning into something not at all appropriate for a hospital.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Tetsurou says breathlessly, wrenching himself away and hovering a hand helplessly over the wound.

“It’s fine,” Kei says, eyes shut and concentrating on his breathing. “But it would be a lot better with some shortcake.”

He feels Tetsurou press a smiling kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Mercenary,” he approves. “Alright, I’ll be back in twenty minutes. Try not to get into too much trouble, yeah?”

“Look who’s talking,” Kei retorts.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all she wrote, folks! (I lie, I'll definitely be back in some way, shape or form!). Thank you a thousand million for your overwhelmingly wonderful support and enthusiasm for the story! I hope you've enjoyed reading as much as I've enjoyed writing and posting :D <3 Now, on to the last chapter and some sex, if you've been hanging out waiting for the explicit rating to kick in ;) Love you all!
> 
> Edit 9/6: LOOK HOW AMAZINGLY INCREDIBLY LUCKY I AM!! MY FIRST PIECE OF FANART AND ITS SO STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL!!! I AM NOT WORTHY!! I LOVE IT SO MUCH <3 <3 XD
> 
> https://onaj-art.tumblr.com/post/619384339720028160/ten-inches-and-stab-wounds-baby-inspired-by
> 
> (PS sex after hospital discharge is probably not the best idea...)

They eat as the sun sets, warm light spilling onto Kei’s bed and highlighting everything in orange and gold. The ward is empty after the lady’s departure and the noise of the nurses’ bustle is faint in the distance; even discussing the case, Hiromasa’s unrepentant attitude, his hypocrisy, his violence and his egotism, doesn’t seem to affect the soft haze of evening and the taste of the shortcake on Kei’s tongue.

“Where are you going when you’re discharged?” Tetsurou asks, stealing the last strawberry off Kei’s fork without either remorse or any sort of pressure in his tone. That’s the only reason Kei forgives him, really.

“Akiteru’s spare room. At least wipe the icing off your face if you’re going to steal from me.”

Tetsurou licks the icing off his fingers until Kei smacks him and tells him to wash his hands, Bokuto’s scolding echoing in his head.

“Sounds like that might be for the best,” he says, sitting back down and displaying clean hands pedantically under Kei’s nose.

Kei wonders at that but doesn’t let the instinctive sinking in his stomach affect his judgement, instead flicking the tip of Tetsurou’s nose and pulling one clean hand into his lap to twine their fingers together. He thought he left this compulsion to touch, to keep Tetsurou close, back in the first months of dating, when delight and awe waged a heady battle – he was allowed to touch this incredible man, and this irritating, exasperating, exhilarating man wanted to touch him too – but if it’s back now...well, he can’t really say he minds. It’s embarrassing, but he soldiered through it then and he’ll do it again now, when the price of failing is infinitely higher.

“You’re worrying again,” notes Tetsurou, setting his phone aside, the lights in adjacent buildings buzzing on as twilight falls. He doesn’t doubt Tetsurou has been doing everything necessary paperwork-wise, but for him to be spending so much time at Kei’s bedside means they’re going to owe Oikawa something massive for shouldering most the load.

“I’m not really...” he says, picking at the label on the cakebox.

“Kei.”

He looks up at Tetsurou’s tone and finds his eyes solemn.

“We both agree we were stupid, but the fact remains we did have a fight and the issues we thought we could out-stubborn in fact out-stubborned us.”

They look at each other, the three months before their split weighing down the silence between them. Still, at the beginning, when there was nothing between them but glances and hope, Tetsurou had been the one to reach out when Kei didn’t trust his own hands would find their mark.

He reaches out now, takes Tetsurou’s other hand and compresses his mouth into a rueful twist.

“I know,” he says, nerves still jangling despite three years’ history but his hand steady at last. “The prospect of your transfer, my department’s first solo exhibition, acting curator, worrying about long-distance, the chores that piled up and the missed opportunities to talk that we blamed on each other.”

“The commitments we both blew off,” Tetsurou agrees, rubbing circles into Kei’s knuckles.

Kei winces. “I _am_ sorry about missing Kenma’s software launch –” he begins, ironing the defensiveness out of his tone at the last moment, but Tetsurou shakes his head.

“I didn’t mean to bring that up or make you apologise again. Kenma understands work, he didn’t mind.”

“But you did.”

“Yeah,” admits Tetsurou. “And then I sulked about it instead of talking to you.”

“I didn’t help by pretending the problem would go away if I ignored it,” Kei owns. “That exhibition – I wanted to throw the sarcophagus out the window the fourth time Isuzu said it would infringe on the security route, and then they wanted to push back the opening and I nearly resigned on the spot.”

“It went well, though? The opening?”

Kei’s mouth thins despite himself. “Well enough, once I dragged myself out of Tadashi’s spare room and contemplated injecting caffeine straight into my bloodstream. If the thing had taken so much from me I was going to fucking make sure it went ahead without a hitch.”

Tetsurou squeezes gently at his fingers. “Tooru and Iwaizumi said it was good, when they went. High praise, you know.”

He rolls his eyes.

“Anyway, when I said you staying with Akiteru might be for the best, I meant, we needed to talk before you moved straight back in like nothing had happened.”

Kei only realises he’s been playing with Tetsurou’s fingers when the man inhales sharply at a paper cut being touched. “Sorry,” he says, relaxing his hands.

“You...you do want to move back, don’t you?” Tetsurou asks hesitantly, leaning forward to try and get Kei to look at him. “You’re not dumping me again and running off with Nanase, are you?”

“I – what?” Kei demands, staring at him. “Nanase? What happened to the greatest detective in the city? No, of course I’m not running off with him!”

“Good,” sighs Tetsurou. “I don’t know if my ego could take that. He’s so...” he waves a hand vaguely through the air, “watery.”

“He’s nice,” Kei informs him, biting his lip. “He’s loyal and not a complete moron. He’s just...I don’t know, is this how older siblings feel?”

Only child Tetsurou shrugs.

“Or maybe he’s a little like Kenma is to you. Granted,” Kei hurries to add as Tetsurou opens his mouth, obviously insulted, “Kenma is much more competent, but you told me what he was like as a child, before he found his confidence and a shitload of money in software. Nanase is a bit like a pre-timeskip Kenma.”

Tetsurou closes his mouth, considering. “I can maybe see that,” he admits dubiously, “but fair warning, I will frame him for some dastardly crime if you do decide watery is your new type.”

Kei rolls his eyes. “I’ve been ruined for other men by a smirk and atrocious hair.”

“Damn straight,” Tetsurou agrees. “Or not, as the case may be. So? Do you want to move back in?”

“I’m sure as hell not staying with Nishinoya forever. I just...you were right, I was worrying when you said that, and I was thinking...no,” and he looks up and into Tetsurou’s eyes. “I was telling myself I was going to try this time.”

“Sweetheart, you already were,” Tetsurou says. “I’m sorry I said that. I was aiming to hurt, but that’s no excuse.”

The apology soothes something that’s still ragged deep inside Kei that he didn’t know was there, and the tightness in his chest dissipates a little. “No – I mean, yes, I promise I was, but this time, knowing what losing you is like...” Kei gathers his nerves, his vulnerabilities and his pride, and finishes, “I’m not going to second-guess myself. I love you. I want to be with you. That was excruciating, please don’t make me do it again any time this year.”

Tetsurou’s eyes are so softly awestruck Kei almost can’t hold his gaze. Is he that bad, that talking about emotions makes Tetsurou look like a white Christmas festooned with chocolate has come early?

“Nope, none of that,” Tetsurou says, swooping in to kiss him before shifting to sit on the edge of his bed. “If being one of the most successful and prolific homicide detectives in the city by the tender age of twenty-eight hasn’t robbed me of my faith in humanity, a few communication issues with my boyfriend aren’t going to, either. We’re only human, Kei; we’re prone to doubt and fear and insecurity just like the rest of the world.”

“The rest of the world are morons,” Kei mutters into Tetsurou’s shoulder.

“Instead,” Tetsurou barrels on, ignoring him, “we’re going to make sure we talk about things. We’re going to go back to having our sacred, no-phones-allowed date night once a week. We’re going to redraw the chores roster again, or we’ll bite the bullet and hire someone in.”

“We’re going to try and leave work on time, too,” Kei adds. “You know I’ve never cared that your job doesn’t run on a normal timetable, but for a while we were both like roommates who occasionally slept in the same bed.”

“Fair enough,” Tetsurou says. “Look at us, being responsible adults. What is the world coming to?”

The world is dark outside but it’s night in name only, streetlights and buildings and lives going on as brightly as in the daylight hours. “Normally, healthy emotional communication such as we’ve demonstrated so excellently right here would be rewarded with equally important physical intimacy,” Kei gripes as Tetsurou kisses the side of his face.

“That’s the most socio-scientific way I’ve heard orgasms described in ages,” Tetsurou marvels, kissing lower down Kei’s neck. “Unfortunately, we are in a sterilised public hospital where you have twelve stitches in your abdomen; this situation I think rather precludes the possibility of reaching the satisfying peak of a little death.”

“God, you’re so hot when you throw around proper syntax,” Kei groans, biting a kiss to the corner of Tetsurou’s jaw. “Get out of here and get some sleep before I tear my twelve stitches trying to ravish you.”

“Your mouth should be illegal, and I speak from a professional standpoint.” Tetsurou hisses as Kei sucks a bruise under his ear. “I’m going, I’m going, don’t tempt me.”

He stumbles off the bed and starts gathering up his things, bending over rather elaborately just in Kei’s line of sight.

“I’ll text you when I get to Akiteru’s,” Kei says when Tetsurou is upright and his brain has restarted.

“Okay,” Tetsurou says, patting his pockets for phone and wallet. “I probably won’t be able to get away before the afternoon. Tooru and Iwaizumi deserve a weekend, so I’ll be taking care of the last of the paperwork.”

“You can’t honestly expect me to believe Oikawa will take a day off before the final i has been dotted and last t has been crossed,” Kei says, raising an eyebrow.

Tetsurou laughs. “He’ll be in tomorrow but I’m under orders from Iwaizumi to push him out the door at lunchtime so they can drive down to the beach in one of the classic cars Iwaizumi’s been restoring. We don’t have that much to do, anyway. There are a few reports to collate, some forensic stuff to follow up, and some actions to tick off in the system, but once your statement is filed, we’re golden.” He bends down to kiss Kei goodbye. “Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. Try and get some sleep, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

But even the third and fourth kiss Tetsurou pressed to his face before he could drag himself away don’t seem to have any effect on the dreams waiting for him when Kei closes his eyes. There’s something behind him, something against his throat; the maze of corridors prevents him from finding what he was looking for, but how can find what he’s looking for when Kei doesn’t know what’s he’s meant to find? He calls for Tetsurou, for Tadashi, for his brother and his old teammates, but every time he spins around to confront the person breathing on the back of his neck there’s no one there – no one and nothing there until his side flares with pain and Kei wrenches himself awake once more.

Even when he reassures himself he’s alone in the ward and his phone is nearby, the dreams don’t ease, and when they do, something in the constant noise of the nurses and the bustle of the hospital catches at his mind and Kei is dragged back out of restless sleep again.

“Oh dear,” a nurse chirps at him the next morning, coming to clean the wound and replace his bandages. “It’s a good thing you’re going home today, Tsukishima-san, you don’t look like you slept very well.”

 _Oh really, what gave it away?_ But it’s not her fault Kei’s mind has decided now is the best time to start combing through what happened, and he twitches his lip into something like a smile. She does let him use the bathroom and brush his teeth, though, before whisking herself and her cart off to parts unknown with a promise the doctor will be by sometime today with instructions and discharge papers. Kei toys with the idea of calling Tetsurou, but he’s either enjoying some much-needed sleep or already at work, so he settles for texting him good morning and braves social media instead.

Replying to all the well-wishes takes an hour, even with Tadashi’s advance warning that several news reports have covered the incident, naming him explicitly. Some feature Saito praising the police for their diligence and reassuring the public that all danger had passed. _“…and to our colleague, Tsukishima Kei-san, we wish all the best and a speedy recovery,_ ” the clip finishes, Saito standing out the front of the museum looking sartorially sombre. “ _To support his and his department’s hard work, we humbly ask you to come and enjoy the display curated by Tsukishima-san on the Nile and its significance as the lifeblood of Ancient Egypt_.”

Kei would never turn down more publicity for his exhibition, but he’d rather not have it appended to his own embarrassing injury. Silver linings, he supposes: Saito is good at his job.

Nishinoya and Tanaka, on the other hand, clearly think it’s hilarious, and he receives so many gifs from _Psycho_ that Kei contemplates setting Ennoshita on them.

His phone dies just as he finishes, and Kei leans back with a weary sigh. Life is hard without a charger.

“Goodness, honey, what’s all that doom and gloom for?” his mother asks, leading the way into the ward.

He lifts his phone in answer and Akiteru sniggers. “Out of juice?”

“Life is hard,” Kei sighs.

His father tuts at him and holds up his charger. “Good thing I brought this, then, isn’t it?”

“And we brought you some clothes, too,” his mother says, kissing his hairline. “The hospital gave us your old ones, but apparently they had to cut your sweater to remove it without…” she waves a hand, going pale. His father squeezes her shoulder.

“Without disturbing the knife,” he finishes gravely.

Kei gapes at them, incredulous. “They chopped up my sweater? That was my favourite!”

“ _Kei_ ,” his mother tuts.

“What? It was!”

But at least he has his own clothes to change into now, Akiteru gripping his elbow for balance as Kei tries not to pull his stitches and pull on his pants at the same time. Then, dressed and illicitly caffeinated, they wait.

And wait.

They wait some more.

“Friday nights, though,” Akiteru shrugs. “Wild.”

Lunch has come and gone by the time Doctor Yusei comes by with instructions and discharge papers, and thirty minutes after wading through the financial side of health care and signing as many dotted lines as the nurse needs, Kei is finally free to hobble slowly down the corridor to the elevator, propped on his petite mother’s shoulder like a crutch.

They get to Akiteru’s apartment in the suburbs an hour later, and by now Kei is exhausted, in pain, and short-tempered. He brushes his teeth thoroughly with a fresh tube of toothpaste and curls up on the couch under a blanket, but endures his mother’s further fussing as he sheds his jumper _in case you can’t get up to adjusting the heating, honey_ , drinks some tea _to rehydrate after the drip, honey_ , and takes some pain killers _because the doctors said it was fine and there’s no point in overloading your body, honey,_ but he all he wants is a shower, Tetsurou and sleep, not necessarily in that order.

“Remember, you can shower tonight, but you have to make sure to pat the wounds dry,” his mother says. “Then we need to rewrap it.”

“Haruhi, dear, I think he knows,” his father says. “We should let him have a nap.”

“There’s a lovely park nearby,” Akiteru volunteers. “Let’s get some proper late lunch, and by the time we get back it’ll be time to start on dinner.”

Kei opens one eye at him. His brother winks and leans down to whisper, under the pretence of putting the TV remote back on the coffee table, “I’ll keep them out as long as I can and I’ll open the door _very loudly_ when we come back.”

Kei pointedly closes his eye, ignoring Akiteru’s snigger at the blush rising in his cheeks.

His family sweeps off a few minutes later, all checks for keys and wallets and bags and sunglasses and coats and scarves complete. “Don’t strain yourself,” his mother reiterates for the fourth time as his father chivvies her out of the door. “Call if you need us to come home early!”

“Dear, he’s nearly twenty-six, he’s hardly helpless.”

“He was _stabbed –_!”

The door closes behind them.

 _PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE TELL ME YOU ARE DONE WITH PAPERWORK_ , he texts immediately.

A minute later, his phone buzzes.

Tetsurou [14:56]>> _Let me in and find out_.

Kei levers himself up and limps down the hall, biting his lip against the longing.

“Hello, gorgeous–mph!”

Kei yanks him inside with two fistfuls of jacket and seals his mouth over Tetsurou’s.

Tetsurou kicks the door closed behind him and cradles Kei’s face as he devours him in turn, pulling off Kei’s glasses and fumbling them on the hall table to deepen the kiss without obstruction. Kei offers nothing in protest except a moan when Tetsurou pulls back to pant, “Are you sure?”

“God, please touch me,” he moans, loosening his grip to splay his hands over Tetsurou’s chest, then slides them up his neck and down his back. “Tetsurou, if you don’t get your hands on me I’m going to do something drastic –”

He’s wrung out and on edge, tense and tired and jumpy and stuck inside his head. Tetsurou’s eyes go dark and molten as he pushes his fingers back into Kei’s hair, tipping Kei’s jaw up with thumbs under the corners. “I know,” he says, voice gone low and rich. “I know.”

He presses a slow, open-mouthed kiss to Kei’s throat just over the thin red line, letting the edges of his teeth graze Kei’s skin before lapping with his tongue. Kei shudders, one hand gripping Tetsurou’s shoulder so tightly he’s sure, in a distant part of his mind, that it has to hurt, and the other clutching his shirt under the jacket. The breath rushes out of his lungs in anticipation of the bite, but Tetsurou simply glides his mouth higher and repeats the process. Kiss, lick, kiss, lick – only under Kei’s ear does he suck, laving over the sting with warm swipes of his tongue.

“I love you, Kei,” he murmurs in Kei’s ear, and kisses his earlobe before biting it. “And now that you’re mine again, I’m going to have my hands _all over you_.”

“Then maybe get a move on,” rasps Kei, tugging at Tetsurou’s shirt to pull it from his waistband. Finally, planes of warm smooth skin reveal themselves to his fingers, and Kei sweeps his hand up, digging his nails in to make a point – five points – over Tetsurou’s shoulder blade. “And maybe – ah! – move this away from the front door.”

Tetsurou kisses him again, hot and deep, as perfect as ever and everything Kei needs for the rest of his life. He kisses back, can’t not, and bites down on Tetsurou’s bottom lip as a thigh reacquaints itself with the growing ache between his own. “Fuck!”

“Not quite, my moon and stars,” Tetsurou purrs, pulling at Kei’s hair until the delightful twinge in his scalp sends its sparks down to his dick. “Ten inches and stab wounds, remember?”

Kei hisses, gets an answering hand in Tetsurou’s hair, and kisses him until he’s satisfied all the air in Tetsurou’s lungs is now his own. The other hand is engaged in reaffirming that Tetsurou’s ass is as perfect as ever, and god, it is, it really is.

“God, I’ve missed you,” Tetsurou pants, finally beginning to shuffle them backwards. “So fucking much.” He has to take his hands off Kei to shrug his coat and suit jacket off, and Kei mourns the loss even as Tetsurou kisses him deep enough to have his head spinning.

“Missed you,” he gasps, making the heroic choice to tear his hand away from Tetsurou’s ass and unbuckle his belt instead. “Couldn’t sleep without you. Couldn’t eat.”

“ _Kei_ ,” Tetsurou groans, managing to get them both down to shirts and trousers without moving his mouth too far. “Bedroom, where.”

“Here,” he says, finally unbuttoning the last obstruction on Tetsurou’s shirt and pushing it off his shoulders. Tetsurou peels one hand away from Kei’s body at a time to shed the shirt, and Kei runs his hands hungrily all over Tetsurou’s familiar skin, reassuring himself every freckle is where he left it as muscles ripple beneath his hands. They stagger through the door a strange four-legged mess, almost tripping over each other’s feet, unwilling to part far enough to breathe, let alone navigate the furniture. Tetsurou swears as his hip catches the edge of the dresser but clutches Kei closer to him, and Kei melts against him until –

“Fuck!”

Tetsurou freezes against him, yanking his hand away from Kei’s lower back. “God, I’m sorry –”

“No, it’s fine,” Kei says, breathing through gritted teeth and trying to pry his fingers out of Tetsurou’s shoulders before he leaves bruises.

“It’s not,” Tetsurou murmurs, breathless but calm, nudging Kei’s nose with his own and sweeping his hands carefully feather-light up and down his sides. “If this is hurting you –”

“It isn’t,” protests Kei, cradling Tetsurou’s face and brushing his thumbs along his cheekbones. He tries to kiss Tetsurou again, but Tetsurou turns his head so Kei meets his cheek instead and grips the crests of Kei’s hipbones. The half-formed whimper that escapes will haunt him when his head is clear, but for now, it’s the only thing on his mind. “Please,” he whispers, pressing his forehead desperately to Tetsurou’s.

Tetsurou kisses him slowly this time, achingly slowly. Kei’s breathing hitches and his heart squeezes; his fingers are trembling against Tetsurou’s face but he dare not move and break the spell.

“Shhh, sweetheart,” Tetsurou whispers, pulling back before brushing a butterfly kiss to each edge of Kei’s mouth. “I’ve got you.”

He turns his face into Kei’s palm and kisses the centre, and then the grip on Kei’s hipbones change from something keeping him gently at bay into an invitation as Tetsurou begins to crouch –

A breath shudders out of Kei and he yanks Tetsurou back to his feet, “Don’t!”

Tetsurou regains his balance immediately, but his hands hover uncertainly over Kei’s waist as his eyes flit back and forth across Kei’s face. “Kei?”

His heart is pounding hard enough it makes him feel a little dizzy, the painkiller isn’t having much effect anymore, and Kei’s eyes are suddenly burning nonsensically when the love of his life is standing right in front of him, offering him a blowjob.

“Sweetheart,” croons Tetsurou, gathering him into his arms. Kei holds himself stiffly for one fraught moment before his lungs accept a breath and he gives in, leaning his weight against Tetsurou and curving down just enough to hide his face where Tetsurou’s neck meets his shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers thickly, swallowing.

“Hey, it’s alright, don’t apologise,” Tetsurou murmurs, swaying slightly side to side. “What’s wrong? Are you in pain? Are we moving too fast?”

“No,” he hiccups, pressing his palms flat to Tetsurou’s back and stroking them up and down the broad expanse of warm skin. “I don’t know. I just – I haven’t been able to shower properly and I’m all hospital antiseptic-y and I don’t – it should be –”

This is so stupid, he tells himself. He’s got Tetsurou in his arms at long last, and he can’t even get himself out of his own head long enough to enjoy it. What is _wrong_ with him? Everything is too much and not enough, light too bright and sound too loud. “I’m sorry…”

Tetsurou nuzzles the side of his face. “Yeah, poor me. Got my lover half-naked and back in my arms where he belongs, I’m really living the rough life here.”

“But you should at least get to enjoy it,” Kei says indistinctly. Tetsurou, though, not only has excellent hearing but an excellent Kei-dar.

“I love you when we have sex, and I love you when we don’t, and I love you when we’re sitting on opposite sides of the living room reading our own books.”

“But I want you to have the best,” Kei protests. “You should have the world.”

“You are my –”

Kei pinches his back warningly. Tetsurou grins into the side of his head, kissing his hair. “No taking a leaf out of Bokuto’s book, got it. Let’s write our own story, yeah? Do you trust me?”

Lifting his head, Kei stares. “Of course.”

Tetsurou’s eyes are soft. “But we hurt each other – deliberately and accidentally. Let me do this for you now, and we can figure the rest out when you’ve had a shower and some dinner and a good night’s sleep.”

“What did I do to deserve you?” asks Kei in barely a whisper.

“Something terrible, no doubt,” Tetsurou replies, leaving a chaste kiss at the corner of Kei’s mouth.

“Don’t even start that with me,” Kei glowers, but the look is only half as effective without his glasses.

“Oho? I thought we were starting something right now, skinny jeans,” and Tetsurou’s hands wander down to his waistband. “Trust me one more time. I assume we’ve only got until your parents come back, so unless you want to sleep, an objective which I am more than happy to support, let me do this for you.”

“I want you over sleep,” Kei says, unfastening Tetsurou’s suit trousers for him, “and don’t talk about my parents when you have a hand on my dick.”

“I’m honoured,” Tetsurou replies, “and technically, this is your fly.”

“So it is. Are you going to do anything with it?”

Tetsurou pops the button and inches the zip down playfully slowly. Kei’s softened a little, he knows, but if there’s one constant in his life it’s how much he wants Kuroo Tetsurou. He kisses him again; Tetsurou keeps it teasingly light, nips and pecks and flickers of tongue until he slips an arm carefully low around Kei’s hips and takes his weight so Kei can step out of his jeans and briefs.

“Hello, legs, I’ve missed you,” Tetsurou serenades, crouching down to pull the jeans away and stroking his hands up and down Kei’s thighs, knees, calves and ankles – he adores Kei’s ankles, god knows why.

Kei threads a hand through Tetsurou’s hair, smiling helplessly. “I’ve been thinking I might get back into basketball,” he admits. “Or at least go running more often.” He’s not out of shape, since he spent too many years of life training one way or another to really fall out of the habit, but he definitely hasn’t kept it up as rigorously as he should.

Tetsurou groans and rubs his face against Kei’s thigh, mumbling about Kei trying to kill him as he sucks a bruise into Kei’s skin and smirking when Kei jerks.

“Only a little death, if you ever get back up here,” Kei retorts, pulling at thick hair. Tetsurou purrs and surges to his feet, muscles flexing. _Thighs_ …Kei’s mouth goes dry and Tetsurou smirks even wider, stealing a kiss before carefully inching Kei’s t-shirt up his torso, letting him slip one arm and then the other out before pulling the shirt up over his shoulders and off his head.

“Okay?” he asks, brushing his fingertips around the strip of bandages holding the two patches of gauze in place. He peers closer and then winces. “Oh, sweetheart, look at the bruising…”

Kei looks down too at the stretch of purple blooming over the top and bottom of the bandages, green at the edges. “I’m trialling revolutionary new body paint, worn on the inside.”

Tetsurou snorts. “I already knew you were a work of art.”

Kei groans, tugging insistently at Tetsurou’s trousers in case he’s forgotten what he’s supposed to be doing amid all his bad jokes. Tetsurou chuckles and unzips the fly, but as Kei leans in for another kiss, tangling his fingers with Tetsurou’s in a playful attempt to be helpful, his body shifts too far and he leans too much weight on Tetsurou as his body informs him with a warning throb behind his eyes that the check engine light is about to flick on.

Tetsurou steadies him immediately. “Bed, I think,” he says. Kei opens his mouth to protest but catches his breath at the last second as Tetsurou’s hand wraps itself around his dick. “At least be horizontal, sweetheart.”

Slowly they shift over, Tetsurou cradling him as Kei sinks down on top of the covers. “Yes, I’m still sure,” he says in the face of Tetsurou’s quiet concern. “I – my body only makes sense when I’m with you – there’s too much up here,” he taps his temple, “and it’s all in pieces – do you know how _stupid_ this all is? A _stabbing_ , Tetsurou, in a _museum_. By my own fucking colleague? I bought him _lunch_. Who _does_ that?”

“Welcome to my world,” Tetsurou murmurs, kissing down his throat and across his collarbone. “And we’ll find someone you can talk to about it, if you want. Talking is good, this was a traumatic experience and you’ll have to process it in your own way. But promise me, Kei, that as soon as this stops feeling good and starts hurting you, you tell me. Promise me.”

“I promise,” he mutters reluctantly. They can talk about counselling later. Honestly, he isn’t sure what he feels right now – exhausted and wired and confused but certain that Tetsurou’s skin against his own is the only answer to his questions. He looked up statistics when he was in the hospital, and apparently the chance of being a target of intentional homicide is less than half a percent for every hundred thousand people. Kei is more than a little indignant that he has to contribute to the maths.

Tetsurou laughs against his skin like he knows what Kei is thinking – Kei wouldn’t put it past him – and slowly aligns their bodies. He ends up pressed against Kei’s right side, half on the mattress and half on top Kei, with his legs wrapped around Kei’s, pinning his upper thighs down and restricting his hips. Kei tests the hold and huffs his displeasure: it means one arm is immobile under Kei’s back, and one of Kei’s is under his head, but Kei understands the reasoning when even a small twist of his torso sends warning flashes of pain through the stitches. Tetsurou waits for him to nod and then kisses him again when he’s settled, filthy wet this time and hungrily open-mouthed, his interest still hard and hot against Kei’s hip. Like wildfire, the glowing embers in his stomach are fanned back into a blaze.

“God,” he pants, when Tetsurou lets him have his tongue back. “Yes, that, let’s…”

A chuckle like rich chocolate, a warm, strong hand around his dick, and another kiss – Kei loses himself in sensation now his body doesn’t have to work to steady itself, and he feels his breath paradoxically come easier even as his lungs strain to speed up, thoughts slowing and fading as Tetsurou kisses him like a brand, a stamp, an anchor.

Nothing matters but the feeling of all Tetsurou’s skin warm against his. Kei can’t touch him properly from this angle, settles for getting one hand in Tetsurou’s hair to tug in delicious time to the biting edge the kisses take on as Tetsurou’s hips start to shift lazily against Kei. The other hand is on Tetsurou’s thigh across his own, sublime mass of muscle unyielding under the pressure of his grip; Tetsurou keeps his hand wrapped firmly around Kei’s dick, tight and warm, and when he swipes a thumb over the head on every upstroke, swallowing Kei’s answering groans, he lets his knuckles brush teasingly against the sensitive skin of Kei’s wrist.

“Tetsurou,” Kei groans, or only thinks it, breathing the word into Tetsurou’s mouth hot and perfect on his own.

“Mmm – do you have –” Tetsurou wrenches his mouth away to ask, pressing his thumb behind Kei’s balls in that perfect spot.

“Ah, fuck! In – in my b-brother’s spare room?” Kei stutters incredulously, biting Tetsurou’s jaw for that.

“Fair,” he pants, pressing his face into Kei’s neck. “Old-fashioned it is, then.” Tetsurou lets go and brings his hand up to spit into his palm, and then drops it back down and that –

“Yes, god, Tetsu,” Kei groans, flinging his hand up to grip his own hair.

Tetsurou laughs again, sucking kisses along Kei’s shoulder as his grip slides smoothly up and down Kei’s dick, tight around the head and using the wetness there to improve the glide back down where he grips Kei’s balls and tugs perfectly, just on the delicious side of too much, pressing his thumb behind every now and then when Kei least expects it. Kei groans every time he does, feeling the flush sweep up his face and down his chest and his dick pulse in Tetsurou’s fist, achingly hard in defiance of the two months he’d passed without even touching himself.

“Let me,” he begins, trying to squirm, but Tetsurou clamps his hand warningly around the base of Kei’s cock and presses more weight onto him to pin him down. All his strength, his focus, back on Kei where it belongs, and he squirms again, delighted, huffing a laugh and scoring red lines down Tetsurou’s back as Tetsurou growls a caution and twists his hand just so.

The breath sobs out of Kei at that, back trying to arch, and Tetsurou growls into his ear, “Breathe, Kei, breathe up through your chest and not out in your abdomen.”

“Why – can you still – words?”

“Because I adore you,” Tetsurou groans, “and I don’t want to hurt you.”

Kei isn’t really aware of anything except for the ache of his dick and Tetsurou’s mouth on his shoulder – he’d say his plan is working flawlessly. His body is some floating thing, pinioned by Tetsurou and unimportant as anything except a circuit of pleasure from the sting of his hand in his hair to the mouth warm and wicked on his throat to the hand tight and perfect on his cock.

“Feels so good,” he moans, digging his fingers into Tetsurou’s shoulder and gulping lungfuls of air as Tetsurou speeds up his hand, curving down a little to bite at Kei’s nipple. At the first sting, he yelps, clawing his nails down Tetsurou’s back. Tetsurou groans deeply and grinds his hips forward against Kei, trying to get his mouth back to Kei’s chest but defeated by his gasps as he holds Kei tighter and quickens his strokes even more, gripping at the weeping head and twisting back down. Kei groans again, shaking, vaguely aware in some part of his mind he can’t buck or it’ll hurt, but his spine has gone tight and white pleasure is cresting steadily in the pit of his stomach and if Tetsurou wasn’t pinning him down Kei would have thrown caution to the wind.

“T – Tetsu, close, there, yes –”

“Sweetheart,” Tetsurou moans, lifting his head to kiss Kei again, “Kei, come for me, let go, I’m here, we’re here again, you’re so beautiful, I love you so much –”

The pleasure surges and catches fire, white heat blanking out his mind as his dick pulses in Tetsurou’s hand, body straining and pinned and slumping at last, utterly spent.

“God, moonshine, so fucking stunning –”

Floating on his endorphin haze, Kei only registers Tetsurou leaning back to get his hand in between Kei’s body and his own when the heat leaves his side. He blinks a little woozily, overloaded brain refusing to restart properly, and flops a discombobulated hand at Tetsurou.

“Want to touch,” he gripes, patting at black sweat-matted hair and tilting his head to watch Tetsurou gasp lungfuls of air and strip frantically at his own cock, bucking up into his fist. “Want you in my mouth, soon as we’re home. And inside me. Ten inches. Then me in you. In our bed.”

Tetsurou moans like he’s been kicked in the stomach and comes, shaking, muttering, “Kei, Kei, _Kei_ ,” over and over. “God…”

He slumps down bonelessly next to Kei, panting on his shoulder. “H…how d’you feel?”

“’mazing,” Kei sighs, turning his head to bury his nose in Tetsurou’s nightmare hair. The scent of his sweat, the feel of his skin…everything is exactly the way it should be.

Tetsurou drapes an arm over Kei’s chest, kissing his shoulder. “Glad…glad to hear, but not quite what I meant.”

“Oh.” Kei frowns, exploring his abdomen. “Disgusting?” The bandages are soaked in sweat and covered in come from them both, sticky and gritty on his skin.

His favourite variation of Tetsurou’s mad cackle is the post-coital version, where he doesn’t have either the breath or the energy to laugh properly but manages a raspy huff that sends sparks down Kei’s spine to his dick, which is really too exhausted to appreciate the sound but still wants to. “Does it hurt, moonshine, is what I meant.”

Kei considers his body. “Tender,” he decides, taking an experimental breath without ecstasy clouding his synapses. “But not sore. Much.”

Tetsurou buries his face in Kei’s neck. “Okay,” he says. “Shower, redress wound, sleep.”

“Kiss,” appends Kei.

Tetsurou hoists himself on one elbow and obliges, hovering over Kei and kissing him once, twice, again and again, soft and slow and just open-mouthed enough to share warmth and breath.

“Right,” he whispers, when the kisses have slowed to just brushes of lips and Kei’s eyes are fluttering shut despite his best efforts. “Up, come on.”

“No, thank you,” Kei sighs.

Tetsurou clambers off the bed and then gets one arm under Kei’s shoulders and the other under his knees before Kei realises what that means. “Wait,” he flails, getting an arm around Tetsurou’s neck before he’s lifted. “Can’t believe I’m letting you do this,” he grumbles, pressing his forehead to Tetsurou’s cheek. “You’ll hurt yourself. Put me down.”

On the other hand, though…muscles. He can feel the flex and bunch of Tetsurou’s abs against him as Tetsurou stands, bearing his weight, and he sighs, spreading his hand over a sculpted shoulder.

“I definitely need to feed you, skinny jeans,” Tetsurou grunts, stepping sideways through the bathroom door and lowering Kei gently onto the stool. “Stay awake so I don’t ruin all our hard work by drowning you in the spray, alright?”

“What’s life without a few near-death experiences?” Kei yawns. Tetsurou flicks his nose for that, but the room is calm and quiet as they throw away the old bandages and sluice themselves down, scrubbing carefully with soap before sitting under the spray. The hot water soothes the last of the aches in Kei’s muscles and feels delightful over the sore skin of the wounds. Tetsurou turns him back and forth a little so he can see each side, clicking his tongue with a storm in his eyes but his hands as gentle as ever.

“When do you get the stiches out?”

“Hmm?” Kei lifts his head, opening his eyes. “Oh, um, week after next. There’s some paperwork in the kitchen, home care stuff.”

“I’ll take a look at it,” Tetsurou says.

“And can you get our clothes? And my glasses?”

“What, don’t fancy a breadcrumb trail for your parents to follow to your naked ass?”

Kei swipes a lazy, leaden hand at him. “When –”

The question doesn’t die in his throat, but he can’t quite work out how to say _when can I come home_ without sounding juvenile.

Tetsurou turns off the water and wraps Kei in a towel. “If you’re feeling up to it, come in on Monday to talk to Tooru as the lead investigator and to the legal team. Then that should be the end of it, until the court date. You might have to testify, but with your hospital admittance and his confession it’s a fairly open and shut case.”

“Good,” Kei answers, and then fidgets with his fingers as Tetsurou pats the wounds dry with soft cotton before reaching for the bandages Akiteru left on the basin. But if you don’t try, you’ll never know. It took him years to relearn that, but he isn’t going to quit now. “Will you…if, you know, you have some spare, do you maybe have some time off coming up?”

Tetsurou pauses rewrapping the bandages, looking up into Kei’s face. “The precinct’s got most of the other officers back after the rally, so we should be nearly fully staffed. There’s even noise of Ushijima sending Shirabu in to run a few training exercises, so obviously now is a great time to cash in some sick leave. Barring emergencies, I’m taking most of next week off, and so is Tooru.”

“You deserve it,” Kei says, fighting another yawn. “You’ll come and keep me company?”

Tetsurou clips the last edge in place and settles on his knees between Kei’s legs, hands cradling his face. Kei scrubs his eyes and focuses as best he can with fatigue nipping at his heels. “I was rather hoping you’d come back and keep me company,” he says softly.

Kei blinks, hands magnetised to Tetsurou’s chest and shoulders. “Yes. Please. Yes, I mean, I will. Come home, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Yes, it is,” Tetsurou murmurs, leaning up to kiss him gently. “I’ll take you home after we deal with the legalities on Monday. We can get the rest of your stuff from Nishinoya’s place later. Sound good?”

“Better,” Kei says, tipping their foreheads together. “Sounds perfect.”

“Good,” Tetsurou whispers, smiling so much he can’t kiss Kei. Kei’s smiling too, so he can’t really complain. “Good, I’m glad.”

“Yeah…”

They might have sat there longer, soaking up their smiles, but Kei’s eyes keep slipping closed, and he feels himself listing further and further into Tetsurou’s arms in a way that isn’t all about getting more skin contact.

“Bed,” Tetsurou decides, scooping him up again, both of them still naked. “Pants?”

Kei waves a hand at the bag his parents brought. Tetsurou unearths a pair of sweatpants, slips them up Kei’s legs, and helps him in under the covers.

“Stay?” Kei asks, settling into the pillow and blinking muzzily up at him.

“Try and keep me away,” Tetsurou murmurs, curling up beside him on top of the covers. “I’ll bring round breakfast for you and your family tomorrow.”

“Mmm,” agrees Kei, sighing at the hand in his hair. “Then…Monday…”

“Monday,” Tetsurou confirms, kissing the corner of his mouth.

Kei can’t remember ever having looked forward to a Monday more as he slips into sleep with Tetsurou’s hand in his.


End file.
